


Tears are Gems of the Soul

by akblake



Series: Hobbit Kink Meme prompt fills [3]
Category: The Hobbit (Jackson Movies), The Hobbit - All Media Types, The Hobbit - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: (but only minor au), AO3 1 Million, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Community: hobbit_kink, Cultural Differences, Dwarf Courting, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Friendship, Hobbit Courting, Hobbits Have Hidden Abilities, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Prompt Fill
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-02-07
Updated: 2014-05-31
Packaged: 2018-01-11 12:27:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 16
Words: 59,660
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1173069
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/akblake/pseuds/akblake
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hobbits have the most unusual ability- when they cry, their single tear crystallizes into a colored gem... Bilbo Baggins hasn't felt emotion since the death of his parents decades ago, but being dragged on the quest and thrust into close contact with thirteen dwarves has awakened his emotions with a vengeance. Can he keep a hobbit's most guarded secret from the outsiders he's befriending, and what in the world does he do about the one he may be falling in love with? He really isn't equipped to handle this anymore! Slow build Thorin/Bilbo.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Cornflower

Bilbo regarded the crystalline blue gem twinkling in his hand for a few moments and then gently closed his fist around it with deep reverence. It was the most brilliant cornflower blue that he’d ever seen, even surpassing his cousin’s prizewinning crop of bluebottle flowers, and he was in awe that it came from him. Actually, every time that he looked at it he was overcome all over again, for he never shed any tears nowadays. He had thought that he broke that ability during the fell winter when his parents died and all he could do was drip blazing tears in the reds, oranges, and yellows of heart-sick sadness. No more tears came after that. None, at least, until now.

 

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

 

He had been spitting mad, like a teapot forgotten on the high boil or a cat dropped into cold water, when the dwarves and wizard unceremoniously invaded his peaceful home. They raided his pantry, destroyed the layout of his furniture, and poked their noses into absolutely _everything_! He’d been hard-pressed to hide his family’s valuables, one tiny chest in particular, so as to keep their grubby paws off of things which were absolutely none of their business. Then, oh and it still made him angry to think on it, the leader arrived to both simultaneously insult Bilbo even while he availed himself of his hospitality. Of all the sheer nerve! Bilbo didn’t know how dwarves did things, but that sort of behavior just was not tolerated in the Shire!

 

But then he found out the reason why he was being intruded upon and could barely restrain the hysterical laughter. Him, Bilbo Baggins, a burglar? He knew that Gandalf’s garden didn’t grow all the way from root to bud, but this really took the cake when it came to insane ideas. What sort of hobbit did the old wizard think he was, anyway? Out there were the Big People, and with them came danger; the old tales always warned of that, warned exactly what happened to hobbits who were unwary enough to be caught out where the Rangers couldn’t protect them, and Bilbo had absolutely no intentions of finding out if those tales were still true or not. He was staying. Right. Here. Thank you very much.

 

Bilbo supposed those words must be engraved in some sort of book dedicated to famous last words, for he found himself sprinting out the door after the dwarves the next morning, contract in hand and hastily-packed rucksack on his back. He swore that the Valar must derive a perverse pleasure out of making a mess of his fate, for the adventure starts out as a rather horrid affair. He does join, yes, and is given a pony to sit upon, yet there is no true warmth shown from any of the thirteen he’s traveling with and he cringes to think how the entire journey will pass if it remains that way.

 

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

 

Balin is the first dwarf who actively makes a friendly overture to him, and it’s even on the first night that they stop. As Bilbo stands with his bedroll in hand, trying to figure out exactly how everything is set up, as he’s never exactly done this before in all of his walking holidays, the little dwarf gently shows him how to lay things out just so to make a suitable bed. Bilbo would have been fine, but it was the additional pat on the shoulder and tin of salve which surreptitiously pressed its way into his hand which broke through his composure. “It’s good for sore muscles,” Balin whispered, and Bilbo was so very glad that the white-haired dwarf walked off then, because he truly needed to dash off into the woods for a little privacy. He didn’t go far, mindful of his safety in the wild, but the pressing urge just couldn’t be allowed where other eyes could see it.

 

There, in the deepening shadows of the trees, Bilbo cried for the first time since his parents died. His heart swelled with happiness and gratitude for Balin’s kind inclusion and one single tear escaped his eye to roll down his cheek, crystallizing until it dropped into his waiting palm.  It twinkled and seemed to shine brighter than the dying sunlight could possibly reflect to show its brilliant cornflower coloring, and he knew what he had to do. Gems like these were never kept by the hobbit who shed them, they were always shared, and Bilbo would do his best to honor his people’s traditions. Bilbo hooked the thong from under his shirt and fished his gem pouch from where it usually nestled safe against his chest; the new gem would be added to the pouch until he got a chance to gift it to its intended, for there were too many eyes idly watching around the fireside at night and he couldn’t risk it. He’d heard that dwarves were greedy for gemstones and went to great lengths to acquire them, so he’d have to be careful in how he gifted the gem. Keeping it for himself never entered into his mind, as that would have been an abomination of Yavanna’s gift. Before he headed back and lost the privacy, though, he did make good use of the salve on muscles which felt as abused as pulled taffy, particularly those on the inside of his legs where he had never ridden a pony before.

 

That night, Bilbo’s estimation of Balin crept even higher as the elder dwarf calmed the camp after Kíli and Fíli’s trick and told them all a heart-wrenching tale about the Battle of Azanulbizar wherein Thorin lost both his grandfather and his father, along with most of their forces. Bilbo just couldn’t imagine losing that many who had been kin, friends… people you had seen and talked to every day, and then after one blood-soaked day never see again. He honestly didn’t know what to say or think. _I’m sorry_ wouldn’t come close to expressing how much his heart ached in sympathy for all those who were there and lost that day. He was shamed to think of how the Shire carried on with grief when they lost ten hobbits during the fell winter, of which two were his parents, and thought that they didn’t truly know the meaning of grief. These dwarves had lost their home, their peace of mind, and then lost the bonds of kinship in battle. Bilbo curled back up in his bedroll and quietly prayed to Yavanna to bless them and to lift their grief, for they had suffered far more than any of the Valar’s creations should be asked to.

 

At sunrise, they were all rousted up and after a quick breakfast found themselves back on the trail again. Bilbo blearily packed his bedroll, half-heartedly brushed at his hair, and made sure to eat as much as he was allowed- who knew when these dwarves would deign to stop next for food? Then it was back on top of the dratted pony for another day of riding. That woke him up quicker than anything as his muscles pulled in pain, though the salve had helped tremendously, and he paid more attention to his surroundings. Luck seemed to be with him today as Balin rode past on his way up to the head of the line and Bilbo quietly garnered his attention.

 

“Master Balin, might I have a word?” he asked.

 

Balin amiably grinned and nodded as he pulled up to ride beside. “Of course lad, what is on your mind this morning? Did the salve work well for you?” he questioned, and Bilbo felt his ear tips heat in embarrassment.

 

“Oh, yes, it did. Thank you very much for that, it was very helpful,” he stammered, still embarrassed that he’d needed the salve in the first place while everyone else seemed to manage just fine without it. “I had actually wanted to give you something,” Bilbo started as he pulled his little bag out from under his shirt and easily fished out the special gem. “This is something very special to my people, and it’s a gesture of friendship to be given, so I hope that you’ll accept it.” He dropped the little stone into Balin’s palm and had to remind himself to breathe as the stunned dwarf examined his tear gem.

 

“Master Baggins, it’s not necessary, but if it’s important to you then I will most happily accept. Thank you kindly,” he bowed as well he could in the saddle. “Though I have seen much in all my years, I have never seen one such as this, what kind of stone is it?” Balin asked, and Bilbo had to remember the explanation he’d thought up last night.

 

“Please, call me Bilbo, and it’s simply a stone found only in the Shire. We give them as gifts to friends, and after last night I hope that I could count you as one,” he stated as lightly as he could.

 

Balin didn’t seem to notice anything off in his words and for that Bilbo was thankful. “Then I am Balin to you, young Bilbo,” he tucked the gem away in a small metal case which he secreted away in a hidden pocket in his clothing again. “And aye I would be honored to count you as friend, lad.” A shout from further up the line caught their attention and cut their conversation short as Balin was called up to speak with his brother and Thorin.

 

He and Bilbo shared a parting nod, and then Bilbo was left to ride with Gandalf. He took one look at the wizard’s knowing expression and frowned. “Not one word out of you. It’s your own fault that I’m here in the first place, so I don’t want to hear anything from you on this, and you’re not to tell them either,” he warned. Gandalf merely had the temerity to chuckle around his pipe stem in return, though he did remain blissfully silent for the rest of the day’s ride.

 

He watched the others as a few days passed, and edged closer to a few, drawn by his own yearning to finally be close to others after long years of solitude- Bofur, Ori, Fíli, and Kíli were the four that he felt the safest approaching as they didn’t seem to mind his overtures of friendship. He felt it strange that dwarves drew his heart’s emotions out of their shell whereas his own people couldn’t. Indeed, other hobbits had stopped trying more than twenty years ago after he’d rebuffed them so many times and given him up as a mad defect, a hobbit who had died inside yet still continued to live and breathe. Oh, they still treated him kindly, but it was with the sort of patronizing air that one would give an invalid, and Bilbo had ceased to care about even that- numb to it. Until thirteen dwarves turned up on his doorstep and aggravated him back into living. He changed his mind hourly whether he wanted to hug them or hit them for it.


	2. Midnight

Tonight they were camped by a river and Bilbo had the dubious honor of being sent out with Bofur to catch their dinner. With fishing poles, of all things. He knew that their cousins down the Brandywine loved to catch fish in this way, and even some of their more adventurous folk in the Shire did too, but Bilbo had never attempted to catch anything with a stick and bit of string. He looked dubiously at the contraption which had been pushed into his hand.

 

“Just what exactly am I to do with this?” he asked and watched Bofur’s grin turn confused.

 

“You mean that you’ve never been fishing, Master Baggins?” He asked in disbelief, scratching under his hat. “I saw your beautiful river on our way in,” Bofur stated as a partial argument.

 

Bilbo shook his head. “Yes, we fish the river, but we use nets and traps, not contraptions like these which can’t be used from the flat banks. Our river cousins use them, but only from boats out in the river,” he leaned in towards Bofur to entrust a particular terror of his. “Hobbits can’t swim, you see. We’re too dense and sink right to the bottom, so it’s better for us to stay on the bank where we can’t drown.” Bilbo shivered at the thought and reflexively eyed the fast river in front of them.

 

Bofur grimaced with him at the same thought. “Aye, that would be nasty. But we’ll be staying far back tonight, and you won’t be in any danger. I can swim better than the rest of them and you’ll be back on the bank before your head goes under if you fall in, I swear it Master Baggins,” he vowed, and despite the awkward wording Bilbo did feel reassured.

 

It was charming, in a way, and touched his heart that Bofur would go to such lengths to make him feel safe. Bilbo allowed the dwarf to show him how to hold the rod, how to cast the line out into the water, and how to pull it back in. The first several times he tried, it got hopelessly tangled (once in his own hair, to his mortification), but Bofur patiently sorted it out and showed him the same steps with the same gentle hands helping him. Never once did he sigh or get impatient, and never once did he grab harder than he needed to.

 

“Have you done this before?” Bilbo asked thickly around the emotion crowding his throat.

 

Bofur spared him a surprised look before he redirected his gaze to attentively watch his own bated fishing line. “Taught someone how to fish? Aye, taught Bombur when he was a tot, though it was more difficult to keep him _out_ of the water than it was anything else. Little guy loved to bob along in the current like an apple, just splashing and kicking. Scared away all the fish but I didn’t have the heart to scold him for it,” Bofur chuckled at the memories. “It’s no hardship to teach you, Master Baggins; you’re attentive, quiet, and patient,” he finished, still looking away from Bilbo, for which he was thankful.

 

The desperate need clawed at Bilbo’s chest and pressed behind his eyes, and Bilbo had to get away. He handed off his pole to Bofur, “I’ve got to go into the brush for a moment, could you please?” he asked, implying that he needed a few moments to relieve himself, and received an equitable nod in return. Bilbo hurried off to a discreet bush and, as soon as he was sure he was out of sight, allowed the tear to drip down his face. He swallowed hard as the emotions released and the gem dropped to his waiting hand. He held it in a small shaft of sunlight to better see it. This one was a dark blue, nearly black until the light hit it, and was nearly mesmerizing in its depths as it sparkled. Bilbo smiled, thrilled with what his heart produced, and clenched it hard as he thanked Yavanna for her gift before he tucked it away in his pouch. He then did quickly relieve himself as his excuse wasn’t all that much of a lie, and scampered back to join Bofur.

 

Two fish sat upon the bank to greet his return and Bilbo happily reclaimed his pole.

 

“You missed a grand fight there,” Bofur teased as he indicated the smallish fish.

 

“I can imagine, though I’m sure that you acquitted yourself admirably,” Bilbo felt sure enough to tease back, earning himself a chuckle as they both watched their lines for activity. The setting sun glimmered off the water, breaking into hundreds of sparkling points, and Bilbo didn’t immediately notice when his line dipped. He did notice, when the pole nearly jerked out of his lax hands and he yelped in surprise as he grabbed at it.

 

Bofur remained as calm as Bilbo was panicked and talked him through the entire process. “Now, you gotta tease the pole back a bit, pull it in some and then let it back out, you want to let the fish tire itself out without getting away,” he gently helped Bilbo maneuver the pole around until they had the fish to the very edge of the bank where Bofur expertly flipped it onto the ground to join the other two. It flopped and flipped in vain as it searched for water, but he’d landed it too far inland for it to make it back. Bilbo nearly felt sorry for the poor thing as it lay gasping, exhausted and dying, but his belly growled with hunger and he pushed away such sentiment. They couldn’t afford much mercy if they wished to make it to the end of their journey in one peace, but he was glad that others took care of this job back at home all the same.

 

“See, your first fish, Master Baggins!” Bofur cheered and Bilbo couldn’t help but laugh along with his infectious smile. As Bofur turned back to attend to his own neglected fishing pole, Bilbo made up his mind.

 

“Master Bofur, if I may?” He paused to dig into his pouch for the gem as Bofur turned a curious look his way.

 

“None of that formal stuff for me, lad, we’re familiar enough that you can just call me Bofur same as all the rest,” he interrupted gently.

 

Bilbo paused, caught by the unexpected gesture. “Thank you, that does mean a lot. And please call me Bilbo,” he invited. “I actually wanted to give you this.” Bilbo held out the little gem and dropped in the hand Bofur extended. “In the Shire, we give a stone like that one to the person we wish to befriend.” He hesitated. “Would you mind if I counted you as my friend?”

 

Instead of studying the gem in his hand, Bofur chose to study Bilbo. “I already counted you as my friend,” he replied more seriously than Bilbo had seen him speak so far on the journey, “but I’d be honored for you to consider me as yours.” As Bilbo flushed with pleased embarrassment, Bofur turned his eyes to the gem and held it up to allow light to pass through. “It’s a curious little thing, though undeniably beautiful, what is it?”

 

“It’s just a stone that’s found in the Shire; we use them as friendship stones. I don’t think we’ve ever gotten around to ever giving them a name, come to think of it. We just call them gems,” Bilbo partially lied again. They were gems, they were found in the Shire, and that particular kind was given in friendship, though he wasn’t being entirely honest. The dratted wizard and his love of half-truths were rubbing off on him, Bilbo mused with sadness.

 

“Then I’ll treasure it, my friend, just as I’ll treasure our friendship,” Bofur firmly stated. He pulled out a small drawstring bag from a thong around his neck, not unlike Bilbo’s, and carefully placed the gem inside of it. He also poked around and withdrew something before he secured the bag back under his layers of clothing. The little something was held out to Bilbo, and he accepted it. “That’s an emerald,” Bofur explained, “only it’s a special one that grew in red and not green. I mined it some twenty years ago.”

 

Bilbo examined the pinky-red bit of stone with wonder. It was slightly milky and hadn’t been cut into a gemstone, but it was absolutely beautiful and he carefully cradled it as he handed it back.

 

“Nope, that’s for you,” Bofur refused. “You gave me the most beautiful stone that I’ve seen in friendship, and I want to give you a beautiful stone in return that represents me.” He turned back to fishing as if his statement and gift was the simplest thing in the world when in fact it had rocked Bilbo to the core. None other than his parents had gifted him things, and he felt his heart swell as he very carefully put the red emerald away in his gem bag to keep it safe.

 

“Thank you, Bofur, I’ve never,” he choked out, and Bofur waved it away.

 

“Nothing to it, and no thanks needed- you’re a good friend, Bilbo Baggins. Now, let’s fish before someone comes wondering why dinner’s so late!” Bofur joked. Bilbo laughed, thankful to clear the air and let the heavy emotion recede again. Unused to dealing with them after so long, feeling emotions well up was a frightening business even if it was welcome in this case.

 

Bilbo picked up his fishing pole and, with hook bated again, gamely cast back into the water. Thirty minutes later, they actually managed to land five fish; two large bottom-feeders and three of the smaller colorful fish which darted near the surface, which should be enough to feed the company for the night.

 

“What say you we head back before they believe the growling bellies are a pack of wargs?” Bofur teased and they shared a laugh as they carried fish and poles back to camp.

 

That night after dinner, Bilbo stayed near Bofur to watch as he whittled on a small bit of wood. He couldn’t tell yet what it was supposed to be but watching as the skillful hands carved off thin curls of wood proved to be hypnotically soothing and Bilbo was content to merely sit and silently watch the block of wood slowly disappear into shavings on the ground.

 

Motion at his side broke the spell and Bilbo looked over to see the Bifur had joined them and had his own carving project out. This one was further along and, even to his untrained eye, was very obviously a shaggy pony. It had the beginnings of a long stiff mane, just like theirs did, and a fat little round belly. He was working on its tiny little hooves when he noticed Bilbo’s curious gaze and held it up for him to see it better. “That’s absolutely beautiful,” Bilbo honestly praised the talented work, and Bifur silently nodded with a little smile as he went back to his carving.

 

The few hours flew and before he knew it, everyone was tucking into their bedrolls for the night. Bilbo curled under his blanket and smiled to himself as he counted another friend in the camp, another stone given from his heart. He lightly gripped his gem bag as he thought of the emerald which resided within and allowed himself to hope that perhaps this journey could turn out far, far better than he’d hoped for when he started out.


	3. Sky

Two nights later, Bilbo startled awake in the dark to find that the tiny little carved pony he’d admired had been finished and tucked into his hand. He turned towards the faded fire to better see the details and was amazed by how lifelike the figure truly was. It had even been rubbed with different oils, nut oils if his nose told true, to lend the mane and tail a darker bit of shading than the body. Bilbo felt a tear well up and he freely allowed it to fall rather than stifle the urge- everyone was asleep and the simple yet thoughtful gift was something that touched him.

 

The tear fell from the corner of his eye and crystallized into a gem by the time he heard it plop softly onto the bedroll by his ear. Bilbo reached up to retrieve it and felt a bit disappointed that he couldn’t really see much about it, other than it was a very light shade of blue, due to the fire having burned down. He kept it fisted safely in his free hand as he rolled over to go back to sleep, still clutching the little pony in his other hand.

 

Morning, when it came, greeted the company with a wet and nearly impenetrable fog. Bilbo could see barely another hobbit-length in front of himself as he maneuvered around and dodged the sleep clumsy dwarves. Finally though, he found the one he wanted and waited until Bifur turned to acknowledge him. Bilbo still clasped the tiny pony, small enough to fit easily into his hand, to his chest and he held out his other hand to the baffled dwarf.

 

“Thank you so very much, Master Bifur, you truly didn’t need to,” Bilbo started out, but was quickly silenced by Bifur’s fierce yet reassuring expression as the toy-maker nodded. He quickly reconsidered that perhaps gift giving could be important to dwarves and he shouldn’t protest, so he simply shook his hand a bit to draw attention to it. “Then I’d be honored if you’d take my gift in return as a gesture of friendship.”

 

The little stone dropped into Bifur’s waiting hand and he rolled it around in his palm as he peered at it closely. Bilbo still couldn’t see much other than to confirm that it was lighter than the other two that he’d given, but he didn’t feel disappointed in any way. They were not his gems to keep, and Yavanna chose in ways which were not his for understanding to match the stone with its intended bearer, so Bilbo didn’t need to worry beyond a wish to sate his own bottomless curiosity.

 

Bifur closed his hand over the gem and, while watching Bilbo carefully, gave a little bow of thanks before he pulled a little engraved silver tube out of his beard, unstopped the top, and dropped the gem inside before he secured it once again among his hair. Bilbo blinked several times as he tried to avoid staring at the odd sight. That certainly was a new one on him, though he could see the benefits of such a hiding place- no thief could easily access it without the owner knowing well about it. The dwarf watched Bilbo carefully and then tipped his head forward expectantly, though slightly tilted to the side; Bilbo’s forehead furrowed in concentration as he tried to think what Bifur could possibly want, until he apparently lost patience with waiting and simply reached up to gently grab the back of Bilbo’s neck and bring their foreheads to rest together for a few seconds.

 

“Oh,” Bilbo breathed in both understanding and some nerves, as he hadn’t expected to be grabbed. “Um, you’re welcome?” he guessed and received a soft snort of a laugh in return as they separated. Bifur at least looked amused even as he shook his head a bit, though it was more like how Bilbo’s uncle had looked when Bilbo was a very young lad and had greatly entertained the old hobbit by missing something that the rest of the adults understood. It was a feeling that he got often now with how reclusive some of these dwarves were.

 

Dwalin’s shout to pack up rolled over camp, though dimmed by the fog, and Bilbo started to turn away only to turn back as he remembered his manners. Just because one couldn’t speak to him in _his_ language didn’t mean that he shouldn’t offer. “Please, call me Bilbo when you speak of me?” he requested.

 

Oddly, Bifur seemed to understand the request for he pointed to himself and nodded meaningfully back at Bilbo. “And I am to use your name?” he guessed again, though correctly this time as he got a decisive nod in return. “Thank you, my friend,” Bilbo offered again before the two had to part in order to pack up their night’s mess and ready themselves for another day of riding.

 

The day passed in dreary, cold, wet misery as the fog didn’t lift until late afternoon, well after it had soaked everyone to the skin with chill water. No one was in a good mood at all and Bilbo kept to the back of the line to stay out of their way, though Bofur and Bifur dropped back regularly to keep him company. Even the normally boisterous Fíli and Kíli were bedraggled and subdued by the time they stopped for the night. No one spoke much after dinner, though Bilbo tucked himself between Bofur and Bifur again to watch as they carved, and he completely missed the mix of curious and indulgent expressions which spread through the camp as dwarves noticed his closeness to the cousins. He did, however, happen to glance up and catch the looks of disapproval coming from Dwalin and Thorin. Those nearly made him shrink back into himself until he was jostled slightly by his friends, and Bilbo firmly refocused his attention to a much more pleasant pair of dwarves until he was ready to retire for the night.

 

The next night was mind-numbing terror and flashes of memory as he tried (and failed) to escape from three trolls. Even with thirteen dwarves fighting them, he still managed to get himself caught, and had to fight down the instinct to shed hopeless tears as he waited for Thorin to stand impassively while the trolls tore him to bits. When they all chose to discard their weapons instead, he was so relieved that he nearly lost consciousness, blackness encroaching and his vision tunneling, but then that could have been more due to the fact that he’d been holding his breath than from anything else.

 

He did his best to stall for time, mind still rather thick from the fading panic and disbelief that they saved him that he honestly didn’t recall just what all he nattered on at the trolls. Apparently not all of it was flattering if he went by the offended looks some of the company were giving him as they dressed.

 

Kíli and Fíli held him back as everyone else trooped off to follow Gandalf to the trolls’ cave and Bilbo turned a questioning expression to them. “Yes, can I help you?” he asked when the pair seemed reluctant to speak up.

 

Fíli nudged his brother hard, nearly making him stumble, and the younger dwarf spoke up. “We wanted to apologize to you, for sending you after the trolls alone and getting you into this mess,” he earnestly said to Bilbo once he’d finished glaring at his brother. He stepped back smoothly, stomping on Fíli’s foot.

 

“And we owe you our thanks for thinking quickly enough to keep us alive. If you hadn’t thought to delay them, we’d be far fewer this morning,” Fíli and Kíli both bowed to him and finished together. “Thank you, Master Baggins, for saving our lives.”

 

“Oh, oh my. It really wasn’t anything special, I’m sure either of your would have done it if I hadn’t,” Bilbo stammered, caught by their honest gratitude and surprised at how much it made his heart swell in return. The brothers hadn’t ever truly been cold or dismissive to him during the journey, only more like his mischievous Took cousins who saw any living being as fair game for their lively pranks, and he easily forgave them for the night’s problems.

 

“Actually,” Fíli spoke up, “I was tied to a spit and couldn’t do anything of the sort, and Kíli, well, he couldn’t think up anything like what you did if you gave him a week…” Fíli’s taunt was broken off as his brother shoved him into a pile of decaying leaves.

 

“What the idiot meant was, even Uncle Thorin couldn’t think of a way to get us out of the situation, so don’t make light of what you did and don’t let his grumbling make you feel like you didn’t do a great service,” Kíli managed to say even as he dodged his brother’s retaliatory strikes.

 

Bilbo backed away to remain clear of the altercation as the two became more actively entangled. “Well then, I thank you for your appreciation,” he said, and slipped away to rejoin the others. Those two were definitely like his little cousins, even down to the fighting, though usually his cousins fought over mushrooms and pipe-weed. He smartly stepped to the side as the brothers tripped over each other and went rolling together down the hill towards the troll cave, laughing the entire way as if it was entirely their idea to go all topsy-turvy down the little hill. As soon as they were out of sight, Bilbo swallowed thickly and allowed his emotions their freedom. He was surprised, yet somehow not truly, when two tears dripped down to land in his palm as perfectly identical gems. They were both perfectly round as all his tears ended up being, yet their color was the exact same shade of sapphire.

 

Hearing voices, Bilbo quickly dropped them into his pouch and barely had it secured when Fíli and Ori appeared within sight to beckon him on. “Come on, Master Baggins,” Ori encouraged, “you really don’t want to miss seeing _this_!”

 

Even though he rather was sure that he did want to miss seeing a troll cave, he allowed the two to chivvy him along and rejoin the others outside of the dirty great hole in the ground. The cave defied even his active imagination. The stench rising from its mouth was worse than the time Odo Proudfoot’s cow fell into the dry well during that summer and they couldn’t get its body back out again. Bilbo felt his stomach rise as he tried to back away. The dwarves didn’t seem to want him to go far, and kept pushing him behind them towards the safety rocky outcropping, which was far too close to the cave for his tastes.

 

He was just considering how best to escape from this newfound protection when everyone emerged from the cave, ready to go. Much to his dismayed amazement Gandalf called him over to hand him a small sword from the hoard. Even as Bilbo protested taking it, the old wizard explained that he’d need it for his own protection. He stopped protesting as he thought it over- last night he was caught because he was attempting to steal a knife from one of the trolls in order to free the ponies; if he’d had his own sword or knife, much of the situation may have been changed. Bilbo gave in and took the sword without further argument even as a cry went up about an incoming intruder.

 

What followed soon after that was far more sheer terror and running for his life than could ever be healthy.


	4. Sapphire and Cerulean

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Interesting relevant tidbit... back before we all became so informal and graceless in our speech with each other, the proper form of address for an unmarried man was 'Master', while 'Mister' was proper for one who was married. So, that is why my dwarves are all 'Master' while one is 'Mister'. It isn't a typo, only one author's love of an era when manners mattered ;)

Walking into Rivendell, coming on the heels of his panicked run, felt almost surreal to Bilbo’s exhausted mind. However, not all was perfect even in the elven haven; the dwarves were not very gracious guests and actually behaved worse than they did when they invaded his smial. He left them to their raucous goings-on and left to find his assigned room just as soon as politely possible as his eyelids were becoming too heavy to keep open. Even his mind, usually ever-sharp of wit, was fogged with exhaustion.

 

Bilbo’s feet didn’t want to walk a straight path as he meandered down the hallway and his heavy pack seemed determined to pull him into the wall. He stumbled yet again, belatedly putting his hands up to fend off the incoming wall, when larger hands grasped his shoulders and gently righted him. His pack was lifted off of his shoulders and he felt light enough to float. “Easy there laddie, you’ll do yerself an injury if you’re not careful,” cautioned a gruff voice behind him. It took Bilbo an embarrassingly long time, almost thrice as long as normal, to recognize Glóin’s speech.

 

And even longer to remember that he needed to respond rather than keep mechanically marching forward like some wind-up toy. “Oh, erm, thank you. Yes, thank you Mister Glóin.” Bilbo managed to force the words out, barely a mumble, but enough to salve his sense of propriety.

 

“Come along now, you’re nearly asleep on your feet. Let’s get you to bed, Master Burglar,” Glóin took charge and recaptured Bilbo’s shoulders in his large hands to steer him down the center of the hallway. In a very detached way, Bilbo wondered if he should protest being handled in such a fashion, but it did seem far more efficient and it did keep him from painfully meeting the walls, so he let go the thought and simply moved where directed.

 

In no time at all he was being maneuvered into a small room and, glory of all glories, there was an actual _bed_ against the far wall. Bilbo made a happy noise and shuffled towards the very welcome sight only to find that it was far softer than it looked and even more heavenly to lie down on. He crawled on top of the covers, was asleep before his head hit the pillow, and didn’t wake until late morning.

 

It was actually when the sun stubbornly refused to shift itself out of his eyes that Bilbo stretched himself under the sheets, groaning at the various pops his joints made as they made him very aware of their aches. He blinked his eyes open and considered rolling over, pulling the covers over his head, and- covers? Awake enough to think now, Bilbo’s mind caught up with the last things he remembered from the last night which included a very embarrassing rescue by Glóin and his crawling on _top_ of the covers to sleep. A quick check revealed that not only was he under the covers, but he was sleeping in only his smallclothes.

 

“Oh my,” Bilbo muttered to himself as both mortification and a warming sense of something else pushed against the inside of his chest. Apparently, after he had all but passed out on the bed, Glóin had been kind enough to settle him in to sleep in comfort; the dwarf must have assumed, and correctly so, that his underclothes would serve as passable pajamas and mercifully stripped his filthy layers off before he tucked Bilbo under the covers. He didn’t know why Glóin went to the effort, but he never expected such care to be directed towards his person.

 

A small tear escaped from under his closed eyelid, tickled against his nose as it tumbled past, and landed with a soft noise against the pillow. Bilbo picked it up before he sat up and gave up on sleeping, caught by the emotions settling in his soul and the beauty in the gem he just created. It didn’t sparkle in the sun like a faceted gem, but instead shone with a glow in the medium blue color of a sunlit river. It was beautiful. Bilbo laughed at himself; he thought _all_ of his gems were beautiful, but then he was rather biased as it was his soul that created them. He pulled his pouch out from under his thin undershirt and tucked the gem safely inside to rest with the others in his collection. As he put the pouch away, he patted it in silent promise- today he’d see that those three precious gems found their intended homes and didn’t stay with him for a minute longer than necessary. Grumbles from his midsection drove him from his bed. Swiftly dressing in less soiled clothing from the pack Bilbo found tucked between bed and nightstand, he left in search of food to fill the empty space in his middle; now that he thought of it, it felt like he’d slept straight through both breakfasts and possibly through elevensies too. No wonder his belly gnawed with hunger!

 

Bilbo wandered from his room, turned right from a dim memory of last night’s arrival, and eventually found his way back to the open area where the company had raucous celebration. The only two souls to meet his eyes today were Fíli and Kíli who seemed to lounge with particular intent in mind for they bounded to their feet just as soon as they caught sight of him.

 

“Master Baggins!” They called together and hurried over to bracket him.

 

“We were just waiting for you to wake up…” Fíli started.

 

“Actually, Uncle said that we’d be training with Dwalin’s warhammer if we woke you…” Kíli interrupted his brother and earned a smack to the back of his head behind Bilbo’s back.

 

Fíli continued on, ignoring Kíli’s glare, “because we didn’t think you remembered where we all ate last night and we thought that you’d like a bit of help.”

 

Bilbo quickly spoke up to avoid any more retaliation, and to forestall another tussle that the two were so fond of. “Thank you both, I appreciate you waiting for me. I was going to look for you both anyway, so it’s a wonderful bit of luck,” he redirected their curiosity away from hitting each other as he pulled out his pouch and unerringly found their identical gems without having to look inside it. “These are something which we give in the Shire, as tokens of friendship, and I’d like for you two to have them as I hope to count you two among my friends,” Bilbo offered.

 

Fíli and Kíli both accepted their dark blue gems with expressions of childlike wonder and raced to the railing so that they could hold them into the light. In the sun’s light, the gems sparkled with inner life unlike any other stone and both were entranced. “What kind of stone is this?” Kíli whispered with awe, not moving his eyes from the sight.

 

“Oh, we’ve never really named them, only given them to people we truly feel are friends, and even then we’ve never really given them to anyone who isn’t a hobbit,” Bilbo again spoke around the truth to protect his people’s secrets.

 

Fíli did look at him then. “Are you sure that this is allowed, then?” he asked, looking very familiar with kin-only customs.

 

Bilbo had to laugh at that. “Oh, it’s perfectly fine, truly. They’ve given up on making me follow the rules anyway, so no one much cares,” he brushed aside the concern even as he looked away to hide his feelings. No, his fellow hobbits didn’t much care at all, but it wasn’t so much because he didn’t follow the rules as because he had nearly died inside and they’d given up on him; had long given up on trying to bring the spark of his soul back to life.

 

A shoulder bumping into his quickly brought him out of the morose thoughts and he turned back to find Fíli standing beside him, Kíli slightly behind. Both wore more serious expressions than he was used to seeing and it drove home in his mind that, for all their childish actions, the two were actually adults and warriors in their own rights.

 

“We would be honored for you to call us friends, Master Baggins, and to extend to you the same,” Fíli stated solemnly.

 

A smile stole across Bilbo’s face at their acceptance. “Thank you,” he acknowledged, “and please, as my friends, call me Bilbo- there isn’t any need for formality here.”

 

Kíli grinned back in unison with his brother. “Then you must use our names too,” he insisted before his stillness gave way to bouncing on the balls of his feet. “Now that we’re friends, can we _please_ go eat? Even though these elves don’t know how to lay down a proper feast, I’m still starving and don’t want to fade away,” Kíli moaned in exaggerated anguish to draw laughter from his brother and Bilbo.

 

“You sound like one of those trolls from last night,” Bilbo teased him while they resumed their route towards the dining hall. Seconds later he was dashing down the hallway as an indignant Kíli gave chase, Fíli helplessly laughing in their wake.

 

After filling his belly with lunch - he’d been right about missing three meals so far - and seeing the brothers off for their afternoon training, Bilbo wandered around the outside terraces of Rivendell to marvel at its beauty. He was looking up at a carving in a fountain when he ran straight into someone and hastened to apologize.

 

Instead of accepting his apologies, Thorin simply cautioned him. “Take care not to get lost,” he rumbled, and Bilbo wondered how that could possibly be a concern. Weren’t they safe here?

 

“If I get lost, I can ask an elf to direct me back to where I need to go,” he airily brushed off both the warning and his confusion.

 

Thorin leveled a flat look at him and Bilbo drew back. “Never trust anyone you don’t know, and _never_ trust an elf,” he spat and walked past Bilbo to disappear around the fountain.

 

He didn’t know what made him do it, but the words, “So then, I shouldn’t trust _you_?” flew out of his mouth before Bilbo could clench his jaw to stop them. No growl of irritation or yell of rage followed, only silence, so he exhaled in relief- apparently Thorin didn’t hear his impertinent response. By Thorin’s own words, Bilbo ought not to trust him as he didn’t know the dwarf at all, yet he actually did. He trusted Thorin to lead them, to make decisions which kept them safe, even if he didn’t really know him at all in a personal sense. But, by Yavanna, that stubborn dwarf got on his very last nerve when dealing with him and then Bilbo usually ended up saying words that he didn’t truly mean to say. At least this time no one else was around to hear his idiocy, he was relieved to note, and quickly fled from the fountain.

 

Wandering well and truly spoiled, Bilbo turned back and found his way to an alcove he remembered which overlooked the training area. It was fairly secluded, but had a bench positioned perfectly so that he could sit and watch while Fíli and Kíli practiced with their weapons. When he got there he discovered, however, that he wasn’t alone- Glóin was sitting on the bench already, watching the two younger ones chase each other around under the pretext of training.

 

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to disturb,” Bilbo apologized as he turned to find another spot, but was called back.

 

Glóin shifted his bulk along the bench to make room and patted the extra space. “No need to go, laddie, you can watch the imbeciles just fine from right here,” he assured. “Dwalin gave up on them a while ago and just let them run as they will to burn it off, at least until their uncle catches them,” Glóin chuckled.

 

The brothers were making a ruckus as they darted all over the open green flat space that the dwarves had appropriated as a practice ground. Fíli leapt over a bench with a yell, both swords held high, Kíli only seconds behind with his own sword in hand, pursuing his brother. They came together in mock fight, traded a few blows, and then at some signal that Bilbo couldn’t see, Kíli was off running around the outer edges with a wild shriek, his brother chasing after. He could hardly believe that these two hooligans were the same dwarves who maturely accepted his gems in friendship; they looked to him more like five year old fauntlings running amok at a birthday party after being fed far too much iced cake.

 

As he couldn’t find a better opportunity if he tried, Bilbo quickly fished out Glóin’s gem and turned to the dwarf. “I owe you many thanks for helping me last night,” he started only to be cut off by a wave of Glóin’s hand.

 

“No you don’t lad. You were overtired and needed help, is all. It’s nothing that I haven’t done for my wee Gimli when he’s tired himself out after a day spent down on the training sands, and I didn’t mind doing it for you. Actually felt like a bit of home, tucking you in, so you don’t owe me a thing.”

 

“Then would you accept my friendship?” Bilbo asked, surprised at Glóin’s gruff kindness.

 

“Aye, that’ll do perfectly, Master Burglar,” Glóin graciously accepted the offer. When Bilbo held out the gem he curiously accepted, the small gem looking even tinier in his large hand. “What’s this now?” he asked.

 

“It’s tradition in the Shire, that a stone like this is given to mark friendship, and I’d like for you to have it,” Bilbo explained, the explanation coming quicker with practice.

 

Glóin searched his expression and somehow Bilbo knew that he didn’t fully believe the explanation, though he secreted the gem away in a tiny gold box which he tucked back under his clothes. “Thank ye, it’s a beautiful tradition you have, and I’m more than happy to call you friend even without it,” he stated slowly. “And as we’ll be friends, I’ll expect you to use my name from now on, none of this fancy to do you’ve been using.”

 

“Of course Glóin, I’d be happy to, but only if you’ll do the same for me,” Bilbo insisted. It was, after all, mannerly for friends to address each other in the familiar whereas he wouldn’t dream of it with the others. Apparently the dwarves had the same belief, for none of them used his given name without his leave.

 

Their talk was interrupted by Thorin’s silent appearance as he stalked to lean against the rail and watched Fíli and Kíli’s antics. Bilbo and Glóin quieted as they watched him in turn, but he made no move to stop the brothers, only observe them, until Fíli happened to look up far enough to catch sight of his uncle.

 

His sudden freezing was comical, especially as Kíli followed suit with the exact same expression, looking too much like two small children caught misbehaving. “You’ll do double tomorrow,” was all Thorin promised before he walked off with barely a nod of recognition to Bilbo and Glóin.

 

Fíli and Kíli dragged themselves off the green, suddenly disheartened with their fun at the promise of twice the work tomorrow. Bilbo and Glóin also wandered off in their own directions, Glóin to cheer the boys up with a cup of wine, and Bilbo to find the kitchens. His stomach was forcefully informing him that it was time for tea, and it had no intention of missing another of the three remaining meals that day.


	5. Ice

They didn’t get to stay in Rivendell anywhere near as long as Bilbo wanted to, though an exhausted and bruised Fíli and Kíli could swear differently- Gandalf got a message to Thorin that sent the entire company fleeing the hidden valley in the early predawn hours. That was the last comfort he experienced for a very, very long time.

 

Following their abrupt departure, it was more hiking, and then sheer terror as stone giants fought each other with complete disregard for the tiny beings clinging to their rocky bodies. By the time they all collapsed in the cave, Bilbo’s chest hurt inside from how hard his heart pounded. He was nearly squashed, then nearly fell, and then… well, Thorin’s words cut deeply into a heart that had only just begun to feel emotion again. Curled up with his back to the company, a tear escaped Bilbo’s clenched eyelids and dripped down to his haphazard bedroll.

 

Aghast that he had so little control as to cry where he could possibly be observed, Bilbo immediately sought out the gem to protect and hide it only to have his hand freeze and start shaking. There, laying so innocently on his bedroll, was a ruby red gem shining like a drop of freshly-shed blood. He swallowed thickly as he forced himself to pick it up. It wasn’t the soul-singing blue of happiness, no. Red was the spirit cracked open and bleeding in sadness, as his mother once explained it, and he _despised_ the color. Reds, oranges, and yellows were the only colors he could cry there at the end, when his parents died, before his emotions fled and left him feeling shallower than a rain puddle.

 

The red gem didn’t playfully sparkle or glitter at him like the blue ones did; it was shiny on the outside as if it had been polished, but on its inside it was cloudy and shot through with cracked faults. Bilbo placed the gem on the rocky floor and used a loose bit of rock to crush the offending tear into jagged and unidentifiable pieces. _These_ colors were never given to anyone and were always destroyed at the first opportunity to eradicate the heartache they represented. During those horrible days that Bilbo didn’t like to remember, he’d had an entire jar of gem shards collected from where he couldn’t find the energy to get up and properly dispose of them in the river.

 

That single horrible red tear decided his mind and Bilbo stealthily packed to sneak back to the last place where he was happy- Rivendell. Lord Elrond had been kind enough to offer a place to stay, and the valley’s pervading peace was a balm to his raw emotions. After so long without feeling, the elven home felt just like paradise and only his sense of honor saw him leaving with the company when Thorin rousted them so early. He did sign the contract, after all, and he was duty-bound to complete its terms.

 

Bilbo didn’t count on Bofur catching him at the cave’s entrance, not one little bit. How could he explain his heartache to his friend? In trying to untangle his thoughts and unfamiliar emotions, he inadvertently bumbled into words which hurt his friend and confirmed his own belief that he shouldn’t be there. In his distraction Bilbo never looked beyond Bofur’s form to notice Thorin silently listening to their conversation, or his look of chagrin as the dwarf realized just how sharply his fear-driven words had cleaved.

 

All of Bilbo’s worries soon were forgotten in favor of new shocks- disappearing floors, falling end over end through the mountain, and goblins in overwhelming numbers. As the company was mobbed by goblins, Bilbo found himself shoved to the ground by a heavy weight in a confusing kaleidoscope of short russet braids, swirling clothes, and large hands. “Stay down and hide!” was hissed in his ear before the protective dwarf was dragged off of him by clawing goblins. There were so many goblins covering the dwarf that it wasn’t until he slashed several off with short knives that Bilbo learned the identity of his unexpected protector- Nori. Bilbo remained frozen on the ground and his small form was completely overlooked by the goblins in the fight that the dwarves were putting up. Even after the goblins passed, he remained pressed to the ground and let himself shiver with nerves for several precious seconds as horror crashed through him.

 

Soon after, he was too occupied with escaping a goblin, finding a ring, and then the pitiable yet disquieting creature in the bottom caverns as Bilbo tried to escape. Then things with the ring took an absolutely _bizarre_ turn. He didn’t even feel the bone-deep bruises from his fall until after he’d dashed down the mountainside and stopped to catch his breath.

 

It was then that he was truly surprised, though, and that turned all his attention from his body’s pained reports. Nori openly admitted to Gandalf and the entire company that he’d tried to look after Bilbo, had tried to keep him safe. Coming from a dwarf that Bilbo hadn’t had maybe two conversations with, it shocked him enough that he didn’t pay any attention to the emotion rising in his chest until something softly plinked against his vest and dropped down between his toes. With the oddly distorted sight granted by his new ring, Bilbo couldn’t exactly tell the true color of the gem he bent down to pick up, but it still sparkled with a slight bluish color and he hurried to tuck it away as he overheard others worrying about whether he’d escaped the goblin tunnels or left for home.

 

He then gathered up his bravery and faced the company to let them know that he wasn’t, in fact, dead. That night counted as one of the worst in Bilbo’s life, even when he thought back to the Fell Winter and all that happened then, because they didn’t get to stop for more than a moment before they were running again. Running and running and running until they ran out of ground to run on, and then they climbed. Bilbo didn’t know what made him dart out to defend Thorin from the orcs, but he found his bruised body crashing into an orc all the same. Perhaps hobbits went a bit insane when exposed to sheer terror for long periods of time? Insane or not, it was still suicidal and very nearly got him killed until the eagles swooped in to effect their rescue. At that point Bilbo had been terrified for so long that he’d begun to go a bit numb to it all.

 

After Thorin hugged him on the Carrock and _apologized_ to him, Bilbo didn’t know whether to check his own head for a concussion or ask Óin to check Thorin’s. Could he possibly have heard right, that Thorin believed he had value? The dwarf’s apology was a blissful salve to his spirit and Bilbo felt the emotions well up again, though he held them off until everyone had descended ahead of him off the face of the rock. Down his cheek dripped a tear to land perfectly in his waiting hand. He couldn’t pause to examine it and stuffed the gem, made all the more precious for the event it commemorated, into his pouch to safely rest with Nori’s.

 

Dwalin trudged back over the top of the rocky outcropping to see what was keeping him, concern actually showing on the exhausted warrior’s face, and Bilbo startled to realize just how long he’d been standing in the fading light, thinking. “I’m sorry Master Dwalin, didn’t mean to hold everyone up,” he distractedly called as he scrambled to rejoin the company.

 

A large hand steadied him when he wobbled a bit on the uneven and deeply shadowed surface. “Don’t fret yourself lad, we’re all done in for. The wizard says there’s a suitable cave at the bottom of this rock, so keep up for a while longer Master Baggins,” he said and then fell back to rearguard position as they began moving again, Bilbo neatly tucked between Glóin in front and Dwalin behind. Even with exhaustion and pain making his toes drag heavily on the dark rock, he felt rather safe between those two large forms. It took until they were halfway down the steep steps for it to sink into his mind that those were the most words that Dwalin had said to him since showing up on his doorstep. A small glow of pleasure warmed the inside of his chest and pushed aside a bit of the weariness; maybe, just _maybe_ , the others were beginning to warm up him?

 

Once they reached the cave, Gandalf was unceremoniously volunteered for the night’s watch as he was the only one in any shape to do so. They set a fire near the cave’s mouth for warmth and safety, and then everyone crowded together to sleep. They’d lost most of their bedrolls and blankets, and in their tiredness no one much cared to be fussy about personal boundaries. There was a comfort in curling up next to a friend and sharing the warmth given off by the other’s body, an affirmation that they all survived the goblins and orcs even if they were more than a little battered around the edges. Bilbo was pulled to the middle of the group along with Fíli, Kíli, and Ori; the four shared a sleepy shrug at the antics of their elders but didn’t bother complaining- the middle was the warmest spot of all and they weren’t idiots. Fíli offered his overcoat as a pillow and as soon as Bilbo gratefully tucked it under his head, he was sound asleep.

 

Late morning found the dwarves stirring from their exhausted slumber with many a groan and mutter. Muscles and joints had stiffened while they slept and no one was in the mood to either rise or shine, though they managed to jostle each other awake as they moved. Bilbo blinked blearily as it took a few seconds for his eyes and mind to decipher that his improvised overcoat-pillow had apparently replaced itself with a thick tunic some time in the night, and why the tunic was moving. As soon as he realized that he was lying pillowed _on_ someone, Bilbo scrambled to sit upright and nearly knocked into Nori behind him.

 

“Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean,” he began to apologize as embarrassment overrode his protesting muscles.

 

Nori and a now-awake Ori simply waved his words away. “Fíli woke hours ago so Gandalf sent him out to hunt for lunch, and I told him to move you,” Ori explained why Bilbo lost his original pillow and awakened on the dwarf’s stomach instead. “I didn’t mind, honestly, and you were so tired that you slept through it all,” he pressed on when Bilbo readied himself to apologize again.

 

“If no one’s throwing curses or blades, then there’s no need to apologize, Master Baggins,” Nori counseled with a light pat to Bilbo’s shoulder as the dwarf ambled out of the cave. Bilbo could see the stiffness in his stride which spoke of the very same sore muscles that everyone else seemed to feel, even if the other mostly succeeded in concealing his pain better than most.

 

Rising with a groan of his own, Bilbo joined the rest of the dwarves outside and genuinely tried to appreciate the beauty sprawling before his eyes. The river he’d briefly seen from the top of the rock wound its way partially around its base in a gentle curve and there was so much _green_. Not the same kind of green as in the Shire, but still far more than he’d seen since leaving his home and it even gave off a sense of peacefulness, as if the grass itself was proud to be growing in so beautiful a location. Bilbo closed his eyes and luxuriated in the feeling it gave off and in the feel of warm sunlight painting his upturned face. It painted the inside of his eyelids red and it couldn’t have been more perfect after the dark horror of the goblin tunnels.

 

So focused on what he could read from the nature around him, Bilbo nearly leapt out of his skin when a hand landed on his shoulder. He twisted to see Nori standing at his left with a very abashed expression.

 

“Didn’t mean to frighten,” he said by way of apology and held out a freshly filled waterskin. “Thought you’d be thirsty and Gandalf claims that the waters here are healing.”

 

Bilbo tasted a mouthful and decided that they’d had far worse so far on their trip. The water was clear but it had an odd aftertaste, like that of a mineral spring, and Bilbo decided to trust Gandalf’s judgment on the matter. “If it’s healing, then we’d better drown Thorin in it- his bruises and wounds are going to feel worse today and something tells me that he won’t peacefully sit still to have them treated,” he suggested.

 

Nori gave him a sly grin and a wink. “Óin and Dwalin are already seeing to Thorin.” His words were punctuated by a bellow and loud splashing from the river, followed by several offended yelps and Óin’s voice. Bilbo couldn’t make out what was said, but the healer’s voice was raised to cantankerous levels and he could imagine the fight that was going on.

 

“I think I’ll stay right here and appreciate the green fields,” Bilbo calmly stated and sat. Nori joined him on the ground and the two deliberately ignored the noise coming from the river; judging by the cheering and clapping that drifted their way, some of their companions weren’t quite as discreet and had chosen to gawk instead.

 

Memory pushed at Bilbo and he hastily dug out the proper gem from his pouch before he turned to face Nori. “Master Nori, my people have a tradition of giving a small stone when asking someone to be their friend,” he held out his hand to the suddenly very attentive dwarf and dropped the small round gem into his hand.

 

Nori held the gem up to let sunlight spill through it and Bilbo could see it for the first time- it was a light and clear blue of deep ice, but rather than sparkle like others he’d seen, this one seemed to have captured a rainbow inside for it flashed and shimmered with ribbons of color as the light was refracted. It was one of the most beautiful gems that he’d seen and Bilbo couldn’t help but smile at it even as he missed where Nori hid it away on his person.

 

“No need to call me anything but my name,” Nori brushed aside the formality and turned sharp eyes on Bilbo. “And I certainly accept your friendship, though I’ve never heard of such a custom.”

 

Suddenly not quite as secure in his practiced lie, Bilbo hastened to explain. “Oh, it’s not something that we often show outsiders, as not many spend time in the Shire. They’re trinkets, really,” he rushed under the scrutiny.

 

Nori seemed to know that the explanation wasn’t quite truthful, but to Bilbo’s relief he only nodded and didn’t argue. “Then I’m doubly blessed to receive both your friendship and your token, Master Baggins, as I’ll wager that your Shire has seen few dwarves cross through it.”

 

“Only thirteen who chose to invade my smial and demolish my pantry,” Bilbo wryly commented. “And please, call me Bilbo- hearing ‘Master Baggins’ all day long does become rather wearying on the ears,” he sighed.

 

“It shouldn’t be so bad now that you’ve got the two twits calling you by your first name- Fíli and Kíli can drive even the Valar to distraction, so I don’t know how you stood it for so long…” Nori started to comment but was cut off as a furious Thorin stomped behind them, going from river to cave.

 

His hair was weighted down against his head with water and he still moved stiffly, though it looked like either the water had helped or Óin and Dwalin had managed to deaden the pain from his midsection as he moved better than Bilbo expected. His face, however, was a scowling thundercloud of wounded pride and the two merely kept still and quiet until he passed.

 

“At least they got him out of that coat,” Nori spoke low as he tried not to snicker.

 

“And into a fresh shirt,” Bilbo leaned in to likewise whisper as they both observed the obviously borrowed and too small shirt.

 

Now that they could venture into the river without risking life and limb, Bilbo and Nori made their way upstream of the churned-up area to do their own washing. The thought of just how far he’d come struck Bilbo as he was finishing- it felt great to be clean, and he was happy to wash up, all without a speck of hot water. Months ago, he’d have refused to even go near the river; he was washing his nude body within eyesight of another person, with very cold water (even if the dwarves didn’t feel the cold in the same way that he did), and he was having to make do with a handful of fine rock sand to scour his skin as they had no proper soap. Months ago he would have kicked up a riot and absolutely refused. Now, though, he calmly did the same as the others and went about his cleaning.

 

So buried in his musing, Bilbo didn’t hear the footsteps until they were directly behind him and turned sharply. Thorin stood on the riverbank, eyes carefully averted, with a small pile of clothes folded in his hands. “Kíli managed to save his pack and these should fit while yours dry. They shouldn’t be too terribly big,” he offered.

 

“Thank you,” Bilbo said emphatically as he took the clothes. “It’ll feel heavenly to rinse the stench of the tunnels and smoke out of my clothes. And please thank Kíli for the loan,” he made sure to include in his gratitude.

 

Thorin nodded and left him to his bathing before it became awkward, and Bilbo was quite thankful to see that the dwarf had come out of his sulk at being forced into having his wounds treated. Between his nosy neighbors and the dwarves, he truly wasn’t surprised anymore when grown adults acted more immature than fauntlings. Bilbo shivered his way into the clean, dry clothes and pulled the leather belt tight before he crouched to thoroughly rinse his very battered and smelly clothing in the river. Without soap, the water and a good airing would just have to do.

 

Bilbo brought his clothes over to the rocky outcropping near the cave and laid them out amongst all the other garments spread to catch the sun. His stomach growled and pinched to remind him that he hadn’t eaten even breakfast, much less any of the other meals that day, and he turned towards the cave to see if lunch was ready. He pushed aside the nagging reminder in his head that he needed to give Thorin his gem and vowed to watch for a good opportunity for it- with the possibility of food, the company was gathered in the space around the cave and he wouldn’t have any privacy at all for it. Bilbo was already violating enough of his teachings by giving the gems to outsiders; he couldn’t bring himself to break further taboo by doing it in front of witnesses, even if seven of them carried his gems. It would just have to wait for a better time. Bilbo unconsciously patted his little gem pouch and scooted inside to check on lunch.


	6. Turquoise

Bilbo truly didn’t enjoy the trek through the woods and fields to Beorn’s house, but if nothing else it did loosen his stiff and aching body. He hadn’t had a single opportunity to give Thorin his gem and the negligence weighed heavily on his mind; so heavily in fact that even Gandalf noticed and called him away from where Thorin had, inexplicably to Bilbo, asked him to travel near the head of their pack with himself and Dwalin. Never had the hobbit felt more out of place and he was honestly relieved to hear Gandalf’s summons and trot to the back of the line to see what the wizard wanted.

 

Upon finding out, however, he wished to be anywhere else. “No, I certainly will not!” he hissed, barely loud enough to carry to Gandalf’s sharp ears.

 

“But why not, dear boy? I dare say that you can trust these dwarves with the secret...”

 

“You can’t possibly know that,” Bilbo cut him off abruptly and glared. “You know our history as well as I do, and we both know that dwarves will go to great lengths to acquire precious stones. I’m not willing to take the chance- I’m not the only one I have to consider. Entire bloodlines were lost, villages were _emptied_ , due to greed and I can’t take a chance on that happening again because I had loose lips!” His fists, held so rigidly at his side, were tight enough that disgracefully ragged nails prickled painfully into his palms. Bilbo couldn’t even look at Gandalf and furiously sped up to walk in the middle of the line, safely away from both the dangerously infuriating wizard and the newly confounding Thorin. He ended up beside Dori and that suited him just fine for although the dwarf was a bit of a pessimist, he also gave off a calming air that right now Bilbo could dearly use lest he lose the very tenuous hold on his temper. And, if he was honest with himself, he could also use a bit of soothing for the very deep-seated terror which Gandalf’s proposal had raised.

From the corner of his eye, Bilbo could see Dori carefully survey him, but the dwarf kindly kept his own words and their day’s walk was a comfortingly silent one. In front of them, Bilbo noticed that though Nori and Ori were in deep conversation, Nori’s head would periodically turn, ever so slightly, to cast an ear back and wondered if the secretive dwarf was trying to keep track of them. He didn’t know what to make of it and so decided to ignore the odd behavior; perhaps he was simply waiting for Bilbo to strike up a conversation with Dori to see if he wanted to join in? Besides, he wasn’t in any mood to spark a conversation.

 

By the time they reached Beorn’s house at dusk, most of Bilbo’s anger had worn down to irritation but the fear remained roiling just under the surface just enough to make his stomach uneasy. He knew his history better than most hobbits as his mother was daughter to the Thain, the guardian of their history, and made sure that young Bilbo learned _everything_. It was terrifying for a young fauntling to learn of such vile things, but she reasoned that her Took contribution to his spirit would eventually send him adventuring, and that he’d be better served to know than to not. Ignorant hobbits didn’t come back from adventures and Belladonna Baggins nee Took refused to allow that fate for her only son.

 

He wasn’t much company that night, despite Beorn’s repeated attempts to draw ‘bunny’ into interaction, and Bilbo retreated to set up his bedroll by the fireplace as soon as it wouldn’t be considered too impolite to leave the long table. It did catch him horribly by surprise, however, when another bedroll whumped down next to his and _Dori_ of all dwarves fussily arranged a backrest of hay to sit back against. Bilbo hastily looked away to tend his own blankets as he realized that he was staring.

 

“Will be rather pleasant to have a soft bed and a roof over our heads, wouldn’t you agree Master Baggins?” Dori called over quietly once Bilbo had settled himself in to sit, blankets across his legs and back against a fragrant pile of hay.

 

“Goodness, yes,” Bilbo agreed. “It certainly is far better than sleeping in the wet, or on rocks, or with the tree roots poking everywhere.”

 

Dori’s low chuckles interrupted Bilbo’s tirade. “Aye, I think that only rangers are insane enough to actually prefer sleeping out in the wild to the comforts of civilization,” he agreed. “Would you care for tea?”

 

Bilbo finally looked away from the fire to accept the proffered mug of clover tea that Dori preferred. In his distraction, he hadn’t noticed that the other had brought along a kettle and mugs along with his bedroll and blankets. The two sipped the sweet, clean-tasting tea in silence and Bilbo felt both the anger and fear finally let go their hold on him, leaving only a wrung exhaustion in their wake.

 

“Now, do you want to tell me what had you in such a state? Sometimes it helps to talk things out, and I don’t mind offering an ear to listen if you’ve a need,” Dori calmly offered.

 

Unease immediately curled in Bilbo’s stomach. He didn’t mistrust Dori, he didn’t exactly mistrust _any_ of the dwarves, but he absolutely could not talk about any of it. He decided to hedge a bit. “There truly is not much to tell, Master Dori, only that Gandalf wished to speak about topics which my people hold secret and I became upset with him,” Bilbo tried to explain.

 

“Well, our wizard does love to poke about where gentle folk know better,” Dori nodded sagely and refilled Bilbo’s mug before topping off his own. “He even seems to know of the secrets which we dwarves keep, and doesn’t that drive Thorin to anger every time he reveals something he oughtn’t to know,” he chuckled again, and Bilbo presumed it was at memories of Thorin scolding the wizard.

 

The two sat in silence again while behind them their companions still laughed and chattered loudly after Beorn stepped outside for the night. Good food and ample mead helped loosen their spirits; a long time on the trail, goblin town, and the encounter with Azog had left them all rather ragged and the opportunity to relax in safety couldn’t be more welcome.

 

Dori shifted about a bit to partially face Bilbo and resettled himself against the hay. “If you don’t wish to talk, then would you rather read a bit from the little book you carry? It’s always helped Ori to use other words whenever he can’t speak of what’s bothering him.”

 

“I think that would be lovely, thank you.” Bilbo pulled the now tattered little book of poems out of his inner jacket pocket and let the rhythms of his favorite verses soothe away the last of his emotions. Hobbits couldn’t cry to release built up anger and so it had cut like jagged shards of glass in his chest until he’d been able to calm the volatile emotion. Dori’s presence greatly helped, both during the day and now by the fire, as he was calm and solid and seemed to know just what Bilbo needed most.

 

After three poems, Bilbo’s throat was as dry as kindling and he couldn’t continue. “I’m sorry, this is the most reading I’ve done since my cousin’s birthday last year and I’m too long out of practice,” he apologized and held the book out to the dwarf. “Would you continue, please?”

 

For the first time, Bilbo saw Dori display something other than kindness or stubbornness. He appeared to be incredibly uncomfortable, as if Bilbo had asked him to do something shameful rather than read from a book, and he slowly took his book back in bewilderment.

 

“I would love to, lad, but I cannot read enough Westron to make it through a single one of your poems,” Dori admitted slowly, shame coloring his face with a flush that had nothing to do with the fire’s heat. Bilbo knew enough about dwarves to know that, to know their maker created them to be especially hardy against fire, and so that left abject _shame_ as the reason for the color across his face.

 

Bilbo nearly reached out to pat the dwarf’s arm in comfort but remembered himself just in time. He didn’t want to further alienate this dwarf who he could possibly call friend, for certainly Dori had appeared to be making friendly overtures to him. Bilbo remembered a bit of information that Ori had casually dropped in conversation back in Rivendell. “You’ve made sure that Ori can read and write, and there’s honor in that, Master Dori. Besides, many of my peers in the Shire can barely read or write past what they absolutely must know for their trades; I was lucky in that I learned from my mother as a faunt.”

 

A fond look crossed Dori’s face at the mention of his youngest brother. “Aye, it was most difficult to manage, what with our finances in the beginning, but I made sure that Ori had tutors to learn his words. By the time that we were stable enough that I could spare the time and coin, I had waited far too long to learn easily. I do know enough that Ori hasn’t guessed; he doesn’t quite know, and I’ve not told him,” Dori turned a sharpish look at Bilbo.

 

“He’ll not find out from me,” he pledged. “Actually, if you’d like, I can try to help you out a bit. Just at night when we’re stopped and everyone else is occupied.”

 

“And how would you go about that, Master Baggins? We don’t exactly have the slates and books that Ori’s tutors carried,” Dori challenged, though he did look intrigued and it encouraged Bilbo.

 

He held up his little book of poems. “We can use the poems. I’ll see if your brother will let me borrow his writing supplies, and then I’ll copy out one of the poems. If I read it off to you, do you think that you can translate it into your own language and write it beside my copy?”

 

Dori caught on quickly to Bilbo’s idea. “I would have to be very careful with the pages, as our language is one of our secrets, but perhaps that could work- having the same poem in both so that I can study the words.” He seemed more enthusiastic and much brighter in spirit than he had minutes ago.

 

Quickly sliding to his feet, Bilbo trotted over to obtain writing materials from Ori. The young dwarf didn’t even think twice at granting the request, and Bilbo didn’t question whether it was trust or merely a sufficient amount of ale which led to his compliance. Nori’s too-perceptive gaze followed him all the way back to the fire, and Bilbo felt it nearly as a physical touch on his back. Nori made it readily apparent without words that Dori wasn’t the only protective dwarf of the three brothers.

 

It was only the quick work of a few minutes to copy out one of the shorter poems, only two stanzas, into medium sized block print and Bilbo felt a wave of nostalgia creep through his heart at the sight. He spent many afternoons as a child printing the teaching ballads in much the same fashion. Bilbo handed the writing materials over to Dori and very carefully did not watch the dwarf write as Bilbo read the book’s poem aloud. He well understood secrets and would try to keep his eyes off the dwarven language as much as possible to repay the respect Dori showed for _his_ secrets.

 

Bilbo returned the writing materials to Ori’s pack once Dori finished, and returned to find Dori closely examining the parchment by the fire’s light. “I believe that this may help, Master Baggins, as I do already know a fair few of these words already. May I question you later if I need to clarify a particular meaning or usage?” he asked.

 

“Certainly, and please call me Bilbo. If I’m to be helping you, then I don’t need the formality,” Bilbo invited.

 

Dori appeared surprised before he gave a small smile. “Then in return you must use my name…” he appeared to want to say something else, but was interrupted by a host of loud and very drunk dwarves trying to set up their bedrolls. The rest of the company had given up their feasting, Bilbo suspected it was more to do with the fact that too few of them were still conscious than any realization of the late hour, and were turning in for the night. Dori hurriedly folded the parchment and tucked it away into an inner pocket of his gambeson with a nod of thanks, nearly a bow, to Bilbo.

 

Caught by the gesture, and his knowledge of the respect it offered, Bilbo felt emotion rise to tighten his throat as he curled up in his bedroll. He carefully turned his face away from the light and let the feeling reign, almost rejoicing in the tear that slipped from the corner of his eye and across the bridge of his nose. It fell to pat nearly silently onto his bedroll and Bilbo tucked it away in his pouch for the night.

 

The next morning he awoke well before twelve snoring dwarves though the bedroll beside him, Dori’s, was empty and tidily rolled up. Bilbo cleaned up his own roll and blankets before he made a quick detour to the washroom for his morning ablutions. Once finished, he was nudged by a large black dog onto the back porch where he discovered both Dori and a small table of fragrant breakfast food.

 

“Going to be quite a few sore heads this morning,” he idly commented as he piled a plate with three kinds of eggs, cheeses, and scones. His mouth watered for pieces of lovely crunchy bacon, but there was not a single piece of meat on the entire table, nor had there been any for last night’s dinner.

 

Dori looked like he was suppressing the urge to snort. “If there are any, then they certainly deserve them. They all know better and can deal with the consequences,” he stated bluntly.

 

Bilbo gave in to the urge to laugh, Dori’s rumbling chuckles joining in. “Oh, I have something for you,” Bilbo prompted as he laid down his fork to dig the gem out of his pouch. He wouldn’t get a better opportunity than right now to do this, and he didn’t know how much longer the two of them would be alone before any of the others awakened to join them. “I consider you as a friend, Dori, and my people give these gems as a mark of our friendship.” Bilbo looked at the small gem before he handed it to the surprised dwarf. It was a very light and odd shade of blue, from what he saw of it, and it looked just like the turquoise stones that his mother used to have in her Market Day necklace.

 

Dori held it up so that he could see it better in the light and Bilbo confirmed for himself that it definitely was a turquoise color, for all that it glimmered inside like a cat’s eye as the light hit it. “This is, this is a fine gift indeed, Bilbo,” Dori whispered. “Is this one of your secrets?” he asked as he turned his knowing gaze to Bilbo.

 

As he busied himself with his plate to buy time before answering, Bilbo missed seeing where the gem was hidden on Dori’s person, but it was out of sight by the time he looked back up. “I shouldn’t even answer that question, but yes- it’s a secret of my people and I ask that you never show that gem to any other hobbit; we exchange them between ourselves, but never outsiders.”

 

Dori nodded seriously as he accepted the weight of Bilbo’s words. “Then I’ll treat it as the treasure it is,” he vowed. He then dug into his belt pouch to pull out a tiny piece of metal and dropped it into Bilbo’s hand. “This, lad, is a talisman and a mark of my gratitude for help you’re giving me. None other than my brothers have been so generous, and it’s with pride that I can call you…” Dori broke himself off with a twist of his lips, “Well I cannot tell you the word for it, but you are more than friend, though not quite kin. Perhaps one day Thorin will allow you to be taught our language, and then _I_ will be the one teaching _you_.”

 

Laughter bubbled up before Bilbo could censor it. “I think I would love that, Dori!” he enthusiastically replied as he looked over the small talisman. It was a small disk of gold, about the size of his thumbnail, which had what he assumed to be a sapphire set in the center. Runes ringed the stone and he dearly wished to know what they meant, though he knew better than to ask. “What does a talisman mean, exactly?” he asked instead.

 

“This is one which I crafted, and it won’t harm anything for you to know that those letters spell out my name. It’s simply a piece to bring good luck, and it shows you to be in good favor should you ever need it,” Dori explained.

 

Bilbo sincerely thanked him, very touched at the sentiment offered in the little talisman, and tucked it into his pouch for safekeeping. Soon after, very grumpy dwarves interrupted the morning’s peace and Bilbo retreated to avoid the growling and grumbling as sour stomachs and sore heads certainly didn’t sweeten dwarven tempers. Somehow, though, he never found the right time to give Thorin his gem- Bilbo was called over to smoke with Thorin several times, but there were always too many dwarves milling about to have privacy. Guilt nipped at him, but he promised himself that _later_ , later he’d find the perfect time.


	7. Prussian

Bilbo truly, _truly_ , wished that he could go back to Beorn’s. He’d even put up with being called ‘bunny’ and willingly forget that he’d had any other name if it got him out of this forsaken forest. This place wasn’t natural at all, for all that it had trees growing in it, and simply walking into it, for a creature of Yavanna, felt like being wrapped under layers of suffocating wet burlap. Even their wizard had left them without his presence in this nightmarish place, to stumble through it on their own. A bump at his shoulder pulled Bilbo out of his spiraling thoughts and he looked over at Ori with a gasp.

 

“Can you feel it more than we can, Master Baggins?” Ori quietly asked as they walked along the gloomy trail through the aptly named Mirkwood. A week of slow walking, as slow was all that they could manage through the forest’s perpetual twilight and overgrowth, had worn on them all and sullen dwarves huddled into their cloaks, shoulders hunched instinctively against the air’s sinister feel. Even Thorin’s odd habit of calling Bilbo forward to walk with him and Dwalin, or him and Balin, had loosened in the pervading murk.

 

Bilbo swallowed a couple of times to wet his mouth enough to talk as rationing had left him feeling parched. “Oh yes,” he couldn’t help but whisper as his eyes darted up into the ruined canopy, “we were made to feel the growing things, the sun and the wind, and this place is the most profane perversion of that.” He had Ori’s complete attention, and the dwarf was polite enough not to interrupt with questions. “The trees grow, but they’re twisted things which turn towards shadow and away from the light. The very air is foul like a poison, and there is no breath of wind to stir it. Nothing good grows here, nothing of Yavanna’s glory,” Bilbo shivered and hunched in on himself. Ori gently leaned against him as they walked and shared his warmth, and more importantly, shared the comfort of his presence.

 

“I can’t feel all that,” Ori started, “but I can feel the ground and stone. My feet tell me that there’s no life under us, nothing whispering to be discovered, and the stones are tortured things who have no voices left to speak with. Their silence makes me want to cry,” Ori admitted with his own whisper, as if ashamed of his response.

 

As silence fell again, Bilbo gently bumped Ori’s shoulder to offer comfort and got a tiny smile in return. That night, rather than sleep near the outskirts of the group as was his habit, Bilbo took a chance and set up his bedroll between Bofur and Dori’s family clusters. He got a welcoming pat on the shoulder from Bifur, who noticed him first, received an approving nod from Nori, and felt something tight in his chest unclench. He hadn’t been certain that his friends would all wish to remain openly friendly, especially in this dark place, and had been keeping his distance to not stretch the tenuous ties of friendship lest they broke. It seemed, though, that his heart had chosen well and those who carried his gems may just be true friends after all. Bilbo relished the warmth of friendship and the feeling of one less burden pressing on his battered spirit.

 

Perplexingly, Thorin, Balin, and Dwalin also decided to bed down nearby instead of with their normal group. Bilbo gave them a confused smile of welcome and turned his attention back to his thin soup. Dwarves were confusing on the best of days, and right now he just didn’t have the energy to spare in figuring them out.

 

Four days later even Ori’s gentle shoulder bumps couldn’t lift Bilbo’s spirits enough to garner a smile. He felt the forest’s vile darkness press down on him like a terrible weight, a depression which dulled the spark of his mind and shredded his earth sense. He trod along in the middle of the pack of dwarves in a fog.

 

“Master Baggins?” Ori’s voice dragged Bilbo out of his own head, and sounded like he’d been calling Bilbo’s name for quite some time.

 

“Yes, Master Ori?” he managed to mumble through a jaw stiff from being clenched tight against his misery.

 

“Oh, you don’t… please just use my name?” Ori stammered. “Master’s for dwarves like Dori, and I’m not that old yet.”

 

It took Bilbo a few minutes of walking before the tiny joke sunk in and he gave a tiny chuckle.

 

Ori brightened as his plan met with success. “There now, that’s better!” he cheered and Bilbo made an effort to be more aware.

 

As he looked up to take notice of more than just his feet trudging over the overgrown path, he caught Bombur moving back from his side and a flash of light hair brought his attention forward to catch Thorin turn forward as Fíli wove through the dwarves to walk by his uncle’s side. Bilbo breathed deeply to push aside the urge to cry as their actions caught up to him- he hadn’t been paying any attention to where he’d been walking, but his friends had gathered around to make sure that he never stumbled or strayed off the path. The emotions in his chest beat back the dead feeling from his earth sense and warmed him.

 

“I wanted to thank you for what you’ve done for Nori,” Ori whispered to Bilbo once the other dwarves had moved back to their normal walking distance. “Too many judge without bothering to get to know my brother, and your friendship truly touched him. He won’t say it himself, but both Dori and I appreciate your generous heart.”

 

“Nori’s a good dwarf, even if he has a few ‘odd habits’,” Bilbo reassured the young dwarf, and meant every word. He’d already overheard talk that Nori was a thief, a scoundrel, but he had been nothing less than generous to Bilbo during the journey and he couldn’t judge another based solely on rumor.

 

Ori was quick to rebut Bilbo’s beliefs. “Oh, but he’s not actually a thief, he’s…” he started to say, then cut himself off in a hurry and jammed his hand over his mouth, eyes wide at the near slip. Ori uncovered his mouth after a second and apologized to Bilbo, that what he nearly said was a secret that wasn’t his to say.

 

Understanding of secrets was certainly something that Bilbo was a master at. “It’s quite alright, Ori, no harm done. I already think well of your brother no matter what he does so it doesn’t change a thing really,” he hastened to reassure, and searched for a change of subject. “What kind of ink do you use? I’ve noticed that its scent is different from what I’m used to using, myself,” Bilbo finally hit upon a topic which lit up Ori’s eyes and started a torrent of words spilling out.

 

Hours later, he had been fully educated on the manufacture, upkeep, variations, and foibles of dwarven ink. It was nothing like the inks which hobbits preferred, being made from iron salts, and it was one of the reasons why Ori was included in the company. Their ink, when left on the preciously expensive processed paper for very long periods without care, would actually _eat_ the paper under the letters; the ink itself would fade to a rusty brown as well. Ori’s main job, aside from documenting their trials along the journey, would be in Erebor’s grand library itself- he was to locate and begin restoration of the mountain’s treaties with the other dwarven kingdoms as well as all of the signed allegiance scrolls. If they were to call for aid from their brethren, those treaties and scrolls would be their only proof of what Erebor was owed. Ori had alluded to a treaty which the elves broke, but refused to elaborate and instead begged Bilbo to ask Thorin about it instead.

 

In return for Ori’s information, and indeed giving in to the dwarf’s pleading eyes, Bilbo shared with the scribe what he knew about Shire inks. Hobbits preferred ink made with soot and animal glue as it never faded or destroyed anything it was written on. The high quality paper was saved for important documents, but Bilbo regularly used a yellow, low quality, paper for his personal correspondence; the ink worked perfectly well on the paper, and one only had to mind not to smudge the writing when it was damp out as the ink didn’t truly ‘dry’ out. He also informed Ori that their printing presses, for books, used a different mixture altogether, but that it was a closely guarded printers’ secret and no one knew what the formula was. By the time they finished their engrossing discussion, hours passed unmarked and camp was being struck for the night.

 

That night Bilbo felt better than he had in far too many nights and looked for a chance to pull Thorin aside to give him his gem. He tried to catch the dwarf as Bombur was making dinner, but Fíli and Kíli insisted on giving their report on the trail ahead. After dinner he tried again but was thwarted when Dwalin insisted on sitting first watch with Thorin and Bilbo was gently shooed back to his bedroll with the admonition that he appeared far too tired to stay up half the night. He gave in as gracefully as possible.

 

Curled up with his blanked around him, this time tucked between Bofur and Kíli, Bilbo let the warm emotions kindle themselves in his heart and caught the tear which they produced. He knew it was for Ori, for the youngest dwarf who managed to be so wise and compassionate as to reach out to draw a miserable hobbit from his suffering. Bilbo held the gem low so that no one else could see it and examined the small round miracle by the fire’s light. It didn’t glimmer, sparkle, or shine, at least until the light hit it just right. As a bit of flame flared higher, Bilbo was amazed to see the gem nearly glow from within with a beautifully deep color. It was a color he knew well- his mother used to paint, loved walking half the day to find just the perfect meadow or stream to serve as her subject, and Bilbo had particularly enjoyed one of the shades of blue that she used to mix. Belladonna had explained that it was called Prussian, Prussian blue, and this glowing gem could have been a drop of that same exact paint.

 

He tucked the gem into his pouch and settled it on his chest, against his heart, as he let the happy memories of painting with his mother soothe him to sleep. It was the best night’s sleep that he had yet in this dark place.

 

Morning saw Bilbo and Ori sent back along yesterday’s trail to pick up deadwood for the morning’s fire as Thorin granted them a very rare warm breakfast. Not looking twice at the unexpected gift, both scurried down the dusky trail to fill their arms with twigs and sticks.

 

Bilbo took the chance to carefully watch, and once they were out of sight of the company, he pulled Ori to a stop. “Ori, I wanted to give something to you in the traditions of my people as a sign of our friendship, and ask you to call me by my name if you would,” he explained as his fingers followed the now-familiar actions of digging out his gem pouch and pulling out the appropriate gem.

 

Ori quickly placed his armload of wood on the trail to free his hands and accepted the tiny gem. There was just enough light even in the dim Mirkwood to make it glow in Ori’s gloved hand. “That’s so beautiful,” he breathed, “what kind of stone is it?”

 

“It’s just a gem that’s found in the Shire. We give them to our friends, but they’re meant to be kept between hobbits, so they’re a bit of a secret,” he warned Ori, not quite sure why he said that last part. It could have been because he already told others that it was a secret or possibly because Ori knew the burden of keeping secrets and would understand.

 

Either way, it drew the dwarf’s eyes away from the gem to scrutinize Bilbo. His hand curled protectively over the gem even as he spoke. “I don’t think that’s quite right Ma- Bilbo,” he boldly stated. “I think there’s quite a bit more to it than that, and I don’t mind you not telling me, but please don’t call this ‘just a gem’. We can sense stone, and gems are another kind of stone even if they’re very pretty. This gem doesn’t feel like a stone- it feels _special_.” Ori breathed the word reverently as he opened his fingers to look upon the gem again.

 

The obvious care and admiration shown to his gem made the breath catch in Bilbo’s throat. Hobbits typically didn’t treat friendship gems with this much care as they were simple gems to make and everyone made loads to exchange with their friends. They were special to Bilbo, however, as before the dwarves came he hadn’t had a friend since he’d barely become an adult. Every tear now was a minor miracle. “No, you’re perfectly correct, it is more than that. It’s just not something that I can talk about,” Bilbo confirmed an apologized.

 

“All the same, I’m honored to be gifted with one, and even more honored that you call me friend Bilbo.” Ori stepped forward to quickly give him a hug and then backed away with a light blush at his impetuous action. He quickly pulled off one of his forearm-covering mittens to reveal a leather bracelet; the bracelet turned out to be a clever hiding spot which covered a small iron tube which Ori slipped the gem into. The tube was then stoppered, the bracelet strapped back into place, and the mitten tugged over it all to hide everything from sight once again.

 

Bilbo couldn’t stop himself this time. “Why such an elaborate hiding place?” he asked.

 

To his credit, Ori didn’t fuss at the slightly rude question or even pause before answering. “Dori made it for me. He said that when they were wandering from Erebor, the only way that they could keep anything valuable was if it was hidden on their bodies out of sight. Gear could be lost, and thieves could steal from packs, but nothing could be taken from the body without the owner’s knowledge,” he explained.

 

“Oh, that really does make sense; especially with this mess of a journey, where we’ve already lost most of our packs.”

 

Ori nodded and grimaced at the thought of _how_ those packs had been lost. “I definitely see the value of it now, but don’t you go telling him that. I’ll never hear the end of it!”

 

They shared a small laugh and gathered the firewood, aware that they’d been gone more than long enough already and that others would seek them if they tarried longer. Still, the brief encounter left Bilbo’s spirit lighter and he felt better able to face the day. Perhaps passing on a gift from Yavanna had brought a bit of her grace to shine upon the desolate forest.

 

Bilbo couldn’t know it, but their luck was soon to turn far more sour and the darkness would close in to swallow them all. Even the elves, beings of light, were effected by the evil in their forest and proved to be cruel hosts. After giant spiders, Bilbo truly didn’t have the energy to figure out how to deal with a dark-hearted Elvenking, or how to cope with thirteen dwarves locked in an elven dungeon, but it didn’t appear that he had much choice in the matter.


	8. Robin's Egg

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This _should_ have been split into two parts to keep with my normal chapter size, but I couldn’t find a good spot for it, and the pesky dwarves and hobbit just wouldn’t cooperate! So instead, my dear readers, you get a treat :) See how many book Easter Eggs you can find in the chapter, as I liberally mixed book!canon, movie!canon, and head!canon together in the blender (less of the movie for this one)- they're not all used in the same context, and some are incredibly subtle...

Well-used to the maze of smials and thoroughfares that made up all parts of the Shire, Bilbo felt that he performed admirably in exploring Thranduil’s palace without getting himself lost or caught during the week he searched for his dwarves.

 

The first night, he managed to stumble into a dead end corridor which seemed to host private quarters and curled up beneath a table to keep himself from being trodden upon. It was an exhausted sleep filled with shivery terrors and more than once he roused from the nightmarish vision of his friends slaughtered by the spiders. Morning left him only slightly less tired than he went to sleep, though less terrorized, and he continued exploring.

 

Baths were the next discovery and Bilbo could have cried with relief if it wouldn’t have attracted attention from the sharp-eared elves. Travel, fighting spiders, climbing up and down trees, and fighting all meant that he was positively _ripe_. More used to traveling than he was at the beginning of their journey, he still found his own stench to be repugnant, and he was rather sure that at some point his odor would alert the elves. Bilbo kept a watch on the baths for two full days before he determined that no one visited at night; on the second night, he blissfully bathed with actual soap, a real flannel cloth, and only slightly cool water as he couldn’t risk kindling the fire for hot water. It felt heavenly beyond belief and he nearly fell asleep in the massive bathtub; only the ring, which he kept hooked on the end of his finger for safety in case he needed to be unexpectedly invisible, slipping down to tap against the side of the copper tub startled him back to wakefulness from a hazy drowse. Even as he had to dress in his filthy clothes it still couldn’t dispel his pleasure in having clean hair and clean fingernails.

 

Then, on the fifth night, Bilbo discovered a treasure beyond treasures. He found another wing of sleeping quarters, quite a bit grander than the others as they belonged to the great Elvenking himself, and he couldn’t help himself, truly; once he saw them, he just had to snatch them all up and stuff them in a lump deep into his pants pocket. Bilbo took a bit of guilty revenge upon the elf by living up to his contractual title- he burgled the greatest treasure from Thranduil’s wardrobe… _handkerchiefs_. They were the silkiest material that Bilbo had ever handled, delicately embroidered with a bouquet of leaves dancing across their edges, and worth far more to him than their weight in gold or diamonds. He loved Bofur dearly, especially as the dwarf had proven to be a true friend, but now he could blow his nose without chafing the poor thing raw!

 

Finding the kitchens was both easy and vexing. He found them in the first day simply by following his well-trained nose, for the air circulated very well in the palace and his empty belly provided all the incentive he could possibly want. Bilbo found them vexing as, standing outside the door’s frame and looking in, he could easily see that he couldn’t steal a single bite from any of the counters- the spaces between were far too crowded, as elves were busy cooking, and though he was invisible he certainly wasn’t a ghost. A good bump and he’d quickly be found out as one doesn’t just run into solid air. Hope came in the door next to the kitchen, the wet larder. It wasn’t ideal, but he helped himself judiciously to the raw vegetables in bins, and filched brined fish from the barrels along the outside wall. It all went into his inner jacket pocket to eat later, despite his cringe at the thought of _food in a pocket_. His lingering sadness was that he didn’t have a proper knife to slice any of the large wheels of damp-loving cheeses which the elves kept on wooden shelves. He absolutely would not degrade Sting by turning it into a dining utensil, of all things, and resigned himself to doing without. Another food he did without was meat- the wet larder held the kitchen’s supply of raw meat, as it was the cold pantry, but he couldn’t find where the elves kept their dry larder and the smoked meats. It also meant no bread, but he’d become accustomed to doing without baked goods while on the trail and didn’t miss it quite as much.

 

It was a week into his illicit stay at the palace before he happened upon just the right cellar door and found new levels belowground to explore. One level contained only locked doors, though one thick metal door was twisted horribly, nearly off of its hinges, and he marveled at whatever force caused the destruction. Bilbo couldn’t resist peeking inside but the large room was completely bare save for a bit of straw scuffled into the corners. He shrugged and lost interest in favor of exploring the next level down.

 

The next level proved to be far more extensive, and far more profitable. Bilbo crept carefully down the wide steps, his feet soundless on the worn stone, and found himself in what looked like a massive stone cellar of sorts. The ceiling was rounded above him and corridors led off to the left and right, adequately lit by mounted baskets of some sort of glowing moss which the elves seemed to prefer to torches underground. He dithered a bit while deciding which way to turn before footsteps off to his right decided the matter and sent him scurrying to the left.

 

Not far past the stairs he came to a corridor with the most curious silver placard mounted onto the stone. Bilbo could easily read Sindarin, and the language vaguely appeared to be some variant of it, yet wasn’t. He mentally marked that for all the squiggles, it had a capital T with three funny little hairs on top, and turned left to explore. He passed iron-barred door after door, all with their own smaller silver placards placed just to the right of the doorway, but when he peeked inside to see what sort of treasure deserved such stringent defense Bilbo was rather disappointed to see only plain brown barrels.

 

At the end of the corridor, though, he found a true treasure- Dori. “Dori!” Bilbo whispered through the thick metal bars, mindful of the footsteps he’d heard behind him not that long before.

 

His friend rushed up to the bars and frantically looked up and down the corridor, and Bilbo carefully removed his ring. “Oh, praise Mahal, you’re alive!” Dori breathed with relief and sagged against the bars.

 

Bilbo gently tugged on one of the wisps of hair which had escaped Dori’s once careful braids and poked through the bars. “Of course I’m alive, it’ll take more than a few overgrown spiders to kill off this Baggins,” he bluffed to see his friend lose the stricken look and laugh.

 

Dori conceded his point and then asked if he’d managed to locate any of the others, particularly his brothers and Thorin. Bilbo admitted that Dori was the first dwarf found, though he’d only started looking on this level. “Then I won’t keep you any longer, my friend, and only ask that you come by when convenient- keeping one’s company becomes rather lonesome after a while,” Dori admitted.

 

As that was a sentiment he could heartily agree with, Bilbo vowed to come by again once he’d found everyone and slipped his ring back on to move on. As he left Dori’s corridor, Bilbo again looked at the placard and firmly memorized the odd little shape so that if he ever got turned around, he would remember which corridor housed his friend.

 

Straight ahead was another corridor and Bilbo checked up and down the main walkway to verify that no one would run into him before he darted across. He examined this corridor’s placard and memorized the odd upside down y that it had on the end before he moved on to check each room carefully. This one yielded the same barrels as the last, though from the fragrance in the air and varieties of words on the placards Bilbo could safely assume that they were different vintages of wines. In the middle of this hallway he found another dwarf, Balin, who seemed to be just as worried as Dori had been.

 

It took several minutes to calm Balin and reassure him that Bilbo would continue on to seek out the rest of their companions, Thorin, and would certainly do his best to keep himself safe. Bilbo continued on, from one end of the long walkway to the other, and managed to find twelve of his dwarves… but not Thorin. He spent the rest of that night running messages from one family member to the other, ever sympathetic to their horror of being separated, until he quite literally couldn’t take another step.

 

“Sit yourself down, lad, before you fall down,” Óin grumbled when Bilbo shambled over to give him his brother’s reassurances. “And no need to shout, I’m not deaf in the other ear,” he corrected when Bilbo drew breath and braced himself to deliver the message at volume.

 

Caught a bit off guard, it took Bilbo a moment to collect himself and try again. “Oh, I apologize. Um, Glóin says that the elves put some sort of powder on the cut on his arm which made it stop bleeding and gave him bandages to wrap it.”

 

Óin’s response was cut off when Bilbo crammed the ring onto his finger at the first scuff of a footstep as an elf appeared in their corridor, carrying a try, and Bilbo had to hurriedly back away from the cell. The elf ordered Óin to step to the rear of the room, opened the door, and laid the tray on the floor before he locked the door again. Efficient as the elf was, it only took a few minutes before they were alone again and it was safe to remove the ring.

 

“Least they don’t plan to starve us after what we did,” Óin idly commented as he poked around the food.

 

Bilbo looked up from his captivated examination of the meat, bread, and fruit. “Wait, what did you do?” he asked as the comment caught up to him.

 

“We were originally all in one room together,” Óin explained, shooting him a look, “but we had no intention of remaining their ‘guests’ and several of us worked together to bring down the metal door. They didn’t quite appreciate that, so we got these new accommodations,” he gestured at his smaller and solitary cell.

 

The twisted door upstairs made much more sense, especially as Bilbo had read legends of dwarven strength. It still was rather startling to see evidence of the tales of his youth coming to life. He was startled out of his thoughts by a chunk of bread being thrust under his nose, its aroma still rising warmly from the cut side. His mouth watered- there hadn’t been any bread since not long after Beorn’s house, and his traitorous belly growled.

 

“Well, go on, not healthy to stand there watching while I eat,” Óin chided. Bilbo tried to politely refuse and back away, but the healer just wasn’t having any of it. “Lad, even in this unnatural elvish light I can see that you’re too pale and thin; that forest outside did you an awful turn, and running around in here certainly hasn’t helped any, so I want you to eat.”

 

As he’d been raised properly, Bilbo still tried to refuse. “I couldn’t possibly eat part of your dinner, Master Óin. I have access to the wet larder and can find my own dinner later,” he demurred. He didn’t know exactly how much the dwarves were fed, and couldn’t stomach the thought of depriving one of what could be the only meal he received that day.

 

Óin merely shook the bread in his face again. “I know what’s in that larder, and it’s nothing healthy for you to live on for weeks, Master Baggins, so you listen to me and you eat what I give you. There’s more than enough to share, and you know that I don’t hold to anything fanciful like this fruit nonsense that they try to feed us, so you’ll be eating that as well. And I’ll not hear a word of complaint out of you, lad,” Óin chided as Bilbo opened his mouth to refuse again. To top off the indignity, the piece of bread was stuffed in his open mouth and served as a far better distraction than the words as his stomach embarrassingly overruled his mind. Bilbo didn’t even think of spitting it out, and instead chewed only enough to avoid choking before he hurriedly swallowed the large morsel down. Another piece was in front of him, and he took it with a mild glare of reproof. Óin didn’t appear terribly chastised and simply ate a slice of white cheese while he waited.

 

In that manner, Bilbo ended up eating most of Óin’s bread, half of the cheese, and several strips of the seasoned meat. He also received all the small, slightly bitter, grapes from the tray and didn’t know whether they truly complimented the meal or if his hunger merely made them far more palatable than usual.

 

“Now lad, I want you to go rest, and only after you’ve slept yourself out are you to go looking for Thorin again, do you understand me?” Óin demanded in the firmest voice Bilbo heard him use yet, and he couldn’t help but accede to the healer’s sensible demand; especially when the unaccustomed full meal weighed heavily in his belly and enhanced his ever-present exhaustion.

 

Bilbo started to place the ring back on his finger, but Óin stopped him. “When you find Thorin, the two of you need to talk,” the dwarf hesitantly stated, and then sighed at Bilbo’s puzzled look. “We’ve told him that a journey like ours is no place for this kind of thing, that there would be safer times and places, but the lad’s got rocks for brains and won’t listen to reason.”

 

Silence fell over them both. Bilbo blinked several times and still couldn’t make heads or tails out of _that_ message, though it seemed that Óin had finished what he meant to say. He and Thorin needed to talk, about something which Thorin decided, and which wasn’t safe to be done while they were on the trail? Dwarves were proving to be as cryptic as they were stubborn! “I’m afraid that I don’t understand, Master Óin. About what, specifically, do I need to speak with Thorin? Other than our escape and the company’s state of health, that is.”

 

“That’s between you and Thorin, and he wouldn’t thank me kindly for interfering in his business any more than I already have,” Óin refused, and Bilbo sensed that he’d not get anything more from the old dwarf.

 

As he’d tarried far too long in one place already, Bilbo pushed aside the baffling conversation to puzzle over later, wished Óin well, and slipped off to find a suitable resting place- the call of sleep was becoming nearly impossible to ignore.

 

A handful of hours later, Bilbo shook himself awake with a hastily-muffled shout. His dreams had turned violent, far more violent than ever before, and he suspected that his little ring had something to do with it as he’d never before dreamed of such blood-soaked terrors. Even when in the middle of Mirkwood his sleep was restless, perhaps didn’t come easily when he lay down for the night, but never left him sweating and shaking, a scream upon his lips. Once his heart settled from its galloping pace, Bilbo edged from his hiding place behind a set of empty barrels and set out to reassure himself that his dwarves were still hale and hearty. In this place, even Dwalin was happy to see him, and he spent time with each to comfort them as best he could.

 

To his surprise, most of them had Óin’s intuition and forced little bits of saved food into his hands. Dwalin refused to eat the honeyed peaches on his tray, calling them “nauseatingly sweet elf-food”, though Bilbo knew that he’d eaten them without complaint a few days prior. Fíli and Kíli each managed to talk him into sharing their seasoned meat, concocting the most _unbelievable_ stories as to why he absolutely had to help them by eating part of their meal. Bilbo didn’t have the heart to refuse and only laughed at their antics, forcibly reminded of his little cousins back home who could wheedle their way into (and out of) virtually any situation. He was simply thankful that the boys didn’t have a fauntling’s big pleading eyes to go along with their gift of gab or he’d truly be in trouble.

 

The others managed to talk him into bits of bread and cheese, and all throughout, Óin fussed over the deepening shadows under his eyes and how pale his skin had grown. If the dwarf had his way, Bilbo would have been hauled between the cell bars and straight onto Óin’s cot for a proper rest under the healer’s watchful eye. As it stood, he could do nothing but fret and force more food onto Bilbo, and it warmed Bilbo’s heart as he curled up alone on the stone floor.

 

Bilbo felt his heart wrench as he cried that night, sheltered under a corridor table and hidden in his ring’s horrible twilight world. He gasped when the tear fell into his hand- he could _see_ it! With his ring on, all colors appeared to be dull and muted, dead. But his gem, gift from a Vala and his own soul, sparkled with pure color. It was as blue as any robin’s egg that Bilbo had ever seen and the joy he felt at its sight chased away the icy cold dread which had been stealing across his mind and heart the longer he hid with his ring. That night - first in a very long time - he slept peacefully, gem cradled in his palm against his chest.

 

As luck would have it, the next day was also the day Bilbo found where Thorin was being kept. Two weeks of searching through all of the lower cellars, and he found the dwarf locked in the most unlikely of places!

 

It was only as Bilbo was sneaking out of the baths, he’d had to risk bathing earlier than usual to wash off the grime from taking a tumble into an ash pile while trying to evade a pair of tussling elves and hoped that Óin was still awake to give the healer his gem, that he heard the cursing coming from a corridor that he’d already explored two weeks ago. What truly caught his attention, though, was that he recognized both the raised voice and some of the words- everyone in the company tended to mutter the same words under their breath when vexed, like when Nori managed to drop a load of firewood on Dori’s lap… though Bilbo was entirely certain that wasn’t as accidental as the dwarf claimed.

 

The corridor branched twice, and Bilbo followed to the left both times. He had to dodge sour-faced elves who seemed to be patrolling the corridor until he finally reached the solid wood door where the voice seemed to be the loudest. It was a guest room, not a storage room with bars to allow ventilation, and Bilbo had to wonder how Thorin managed to get himself shut up in there.

 

Bilbo clenched his fist to remind himself to keep his ring on and crouched next to the door to be heard. “Thorin!” he hissed, mindful of the elves. There did seem to be far too many in this area to simply be coincidence, and he assumed that they were a guard against Thorin escaping.

 

Immediate silence fell before scuffles sounded at the door and Bilbo started back at the unexpected noise so close to his ears.

 

“Burglar? Are the others free?” Thorin’s voice sounded from bare inches away through the wood and Bilbo assumed that he’d likewise crouched down.

 

“No, they’re still…” Bilbo had to hurriedly stop as another elf paced by and he waited until he was sure they could freely speak again without being overheard. “No, they’re still locked up- several levels down and in what I think is the wine storage?” he guessed, based off of how many barrels he’d seen and how pervasive the scent of wine scented the air.

 

Thorin did breathe a bit of a laugh at that, which surprised Bilbo. “Thranduil always did love Dorwinion wine and usually imported enough of it that Erebor could scarcely secure a handful of wagonloads before the wine yard’s barrels of harvest were depleted. How fares the company?”

 

Another tense wait for a passing elf, and then Bilbo could answer. “They’re healthy enough, if their complaining is anything to judge by,” he dryly whispered and counted the chuckle he earned as a further victory against Thorin’s previous temper. “They’re being kept separate after they all tried to escape- the elves locked them together in one room. It took me a week to find them, but once I did I’ve been keeping an eye on everyone and spending time with them. You’re the last one, and I certainly didn’t expect to find you _here_ of all places,” Bilbo chided with humor.

 

“Thranduil first…” Thorin spat, and Bilbo had to hush him as another elf entered the corridor. He continued once it was safe. “He thought that flattery would coerce me into telling him why we were in his forest, and then he made a mockery of it when I would not answer,” Thorin explained, though the venom in his tone hadn’t died down much at the interruption. Bilbo wished to bring back some of their earlier mirth as this anger grated on his ears.

 

They couldn’t truly speak of much without interruption, though Bilbo did manage to impart that he had no idea how to get them all out of the palace, and soon broke apart for the night with the promise that Bilbo would return the next day.

 

As he curled up to sleep, again chilled by his ring’s presence and the lonely circumstances that he found himself in, Bilbo was rather disappointed that he hadn’t been able to give away either of the gems he held. Óin’s he could take care of on the morrow, as he had enough time with the dwarf to properly explain, but Thorin? With the elves guarding him, nothing much could be said, and Bilbo didn’t want to just shove the gem at the crack under the door and whisper out a few stilted sentences of explanation between patrols. He resolved, again, to wait for a better opportunity, one where he could explain to Thorin’s face about the friendship offered and give the gem to him properly- it was no mere trinket to be handled callously, after all. Maybe then he could find the time to ask Thorin about whatever Óin had tried to hint?

 

The next day went much smoother. No fighting elves, no chutes and ash piles to fall into, and he quickly visited with his dwarves after breakfast to share the welcome news that he’d finally found Thorin. Bifur, this morning, had saved him apple slices and Bilbo munched on the last of the sweet wedges as he turned up Óin’s corridor. The placard for his had an odd q with a flat head, and Bilbo wondered again what all the odd words could possibly translate out to mean- they were close enough to Sindarin that he was incredibly curious.

 

After assuring Óin that he had slept, though not telling him how poorly, and receiving part of the healer’s breakfast despite assuring the dwarf that he’d already eaten, Bilbo shared the news that he found Thorin locked up in a guest room three levels above them. Óin had a good laugh at that and agreed with Thorin’s assessment about Thranduil’s character. “Aye, that elf’s a crafty one with an insult and I guarantee that he’s planning to tell Thorin where we are sooner rather than later- putting our king in luxury while we’re in the cellars is a cut deeper than any sword can give.”

 

Personally, Bilbo wasn’t entirely convinced, but he’d given up on getting the dwarves to see reason on the topic of elves. He swiftly dragged out his bag and rescued Óin’s gem, the movement thankfully diverting the dwarf from his dissertation on why elves couldn’t be trusted.

 

“What’s that you have there, lad?” he asked curiously, and Bilbo dropped the glistening light blue gem into his startled hand. “That’s a rare beauty,” the old healer breathed in wonder as he examined Bilbo’s gem in the light shed by the elves’ glowing moss. “What kind of stone _is_ this, Master Baggins?”

 

Bilbo tried a slightly different version of his explanation, after being caught out by Ori. “First, it would please me greatly if you would call me Bilbo. As to the stone, it’s a very special gem,” he explained, “found only in the Shire. We give them to our friends as tokens and I’d like for you to have that one.”

 

“Well lad, I’ll call you Bilbo if you’ll call me Óin, and I think you hobbits have a fine way of showing friendship. I’m twice honored to call you friend,” Óin gave him a bow and tucked the little gem safely away in a small pouch he pulled from the inside of his boot.

 

They soon had to separate as Bilbo still hadn’t spoken with Thorin yet, and on his way he overheard the most interesting piece of news: tomorrow the Elvenking was having a great feast at sundown to celebrate his youngest son’s fifth centennial birthday, and as the wine would flow freely in honor of the event, the guard rotations around the dwarves would be cut in half. What caused Bilbo’s feet to freeze in their tracks and then suddenly reverse was overhearing just _how_ the empty barrels were disposed of.

 

Oh, he couldn’t possibly, could he? They certainly were big enough. Bilbo silently dashed back down the stairs to the dwarves’ level and directly across from the stairs, to an area which he’d thought was simply storage for barrels until they were reused in the household. But not so- as he frantically searched thoroughly he could see seams in the rock floor. It was a giant trapdoor which the barrels sat upon! Oh, he could, and the dwarves certainly would behave themselves even if he had to pinch a few ears- they were going to _escape_.

 

He nearly tripped over his own feet in his hurry to tell Thorin about his new plan. Though not quite as enthusiastic as Bilbo, Thorin nevertheless approved of his plan. “Other than finding thirteen more rings like yours with which we could sneak out the front gates, it’s our only chance. Leave me for last, Master Baggins, and bring Nori with you. Thranduil himself holds the key for my door and it’ll take a… talented dwarf to convince it to open.”

 

“It’ll be difficult enough to sneak you out past all the elves,” Bilbo whispered back as soon as another of those elves passed safely beyond hearing their conversation. “I’m not sure that I can get him safely up here and then both of you back down to the barrels.”

 

“Leave that to Nori- I have good reason to trust in his talents,” was all that Thorin would say on the matter, and Bilbo had to give in with a sigh.

 

That night, he slept more poorly than normal. It wasn’t his dreams influencing his sleep this time, but his excitement and anticipation that they may finally be free of this place which kept awakening him. He finally gave up on sleep in the early hours of morning, when the light coming through the corridor window was still pink rather than bright and yellow, and headed down to see if he could find enough rope to bind fourteen barrels together. In one of his dreams, they had all been separated during their float down the river and he opened barrel after barrel only to find them empty. Well, he could do something about that!

 

Bilbo couldn’t find a long rope, but he could find many pieces of shorter rope in another storeroom and contented himself with tying each barrel to its neighbor, over and over, like a giant caterpillar. It wouldn’t be a solid raft of barrels, but at least they would all stay together. He also made sure to visit each dwarf and explain, carefully, just what he expected them to do that night.

 

Bombur worried that he may not fit into a barrel, and Bilbo could set his mind at ease as the barrels were big enough to hide three proper-sized hobbits inside. One large dwarf wouldn’t be completely comfortable, but he’d fit.

 

Dwalin growled at the idea of being stuffed in a barrel. Bilbo, after weathering this reaction six times already, snapped at him. “If you don’t cooperate, Master Dwalin, then I shall treat you like a misbehaving faunt and give your ear _such_ a twisting!” He nearly laughed in relief as that startled the dwarf completely out of his sulk and left Dwalin blinking at him in shock.

 

Nori, however, simply accepted their method of escape as well as Thorin’s additional request. “It will be fine, Bilbo, you’ll see. They’ll never know that I’m there,” he reassured when Bilbo voiced his uncertainty and apologies that he may not be able to get Nori safely there and back without being caught. Bilbo knew that there was something about Nori he wasn’t being told, but he respected their secrets even as he clung tightly to his own.

 

That night, after the dwarves were served their dinner, Bilbo began. He’d followed the elves enough to know where the keys to the wine cellar were kept and he ‘borrowed’ them one by one. And one by one he led each dwarf out of his cell, through the corridors, and into a barrel to be closed in. His biggest problem was convincing each dwarf to take off his boots, as dwarves certainly were nowhere as silent as hobbits and their boots made an awful racket against the stone floor. Bilbo tried his hardest not to stare at their curiously socked feet, though it was difficult. He’d seen bare feet all his life, and boots on big people, but socks? What odd little knit coverings!

 

Bilbo finally had eleven dwarves in barrels with their lids not quite smashed down tight, only enough to look closed but still allow in air, and headed up the stairs with Nori at his invisible back to free Thorin. Nori hadn’t argued one bit at leaving his boots in a barrel, and the dwarf even pulled off his socks to walk barefoot through the corridors. Bilbo got the shock of his life when he moved aside for a passing elf, expecting to hear an outcry when Nori was spotted, only to look back on an absolutely empty hallway. It was only after the elf turned a corner that Nori ghosted out of an alcove and Bilbo felt hope that they could possibly succeed.

 

At Thorin’s door, Nori pulled something out of the hair over his left ear as he crouched in front of the lock and it only took a handful of heartbeats before the lock quietly clicked open. Bilbo gaped and was quite thankful that he was invisible for such an undignified action. Nori whispered that he’d get himself back down to the barrels as it would be easier to move one through the corridors rather than three, and then disappeared down the end of the corridor. After his show of ability, Bilbo couldn’t disagree with him, even though he still worried about his friend’s safety.

 

Thorin quickly stepped through, and Bilbo hissed at him to remove his boots. He moved back through the door, closed it in case an elf passed by, and Bilbo waited. When Thorin next stepped through the door, he carried his boots tied to his belt by their laces, leaving his hands free, and the two cautiously set out down the corridor. After being stepped over twice by the dwarf who couldn’t see him, Bilbo quickly learned to reach a hand back and grab onto Thorin’s wrist to direct him. It earned him a bemused, if slightly misdirected off to his right, look but no complaints and Bilbo took that as permission.

 

Only twice did they need to scramble around other corridor corners to hide from elves, but in the end they finally made it down to the barrels. Before Thorin climbed inside his own barrel, he twisted his wrist in Bilbo’s hold to grab onto Bilbo’s own invisible wrist and _bowed_ to him. “Thank you for all that you’ve done these weeks, Master Baggins. You looked after them when I couldn’t, and for that I am grateful.” Thorin didn’t seem to expect a response, as he climbed into his barrel then, and Bilbo couldn’t have given one even if his life depended on it. He was, quite simply, shocked speechless at Thorin’s actions and had to shake himself back to life after a few seconds of staring at empty space. He’d talk to Thorin at the first chance that he got, he resolved, and give the dwarf his gem- he’d certainly earned it several times over, and it pained Bilbo to keep such a gift away from its intended recipient.

 

Bilbo closed up Thorin’s barrel and then slipped over to make sure that Nori returned safely. The sneaky dwarf gave him a rather cramped wave from the bottom of his barrel, so Bilbo also crookedly jammed on his lid to allow air in during the hours they had to sit. It was a very wrung-out and exhausted hobbit who slumped down into his own barrel and shuffled his lid so that it appeared to be secured. He didn’t have any way of closing it up properly from the inside and could only hope that the stream he’d overheard ran below didn’t slosh water inside. Bilbo settled in for a nap, still with the ring on his finger and his wrist carrying a ghost of warmth from Thorin’s unexpected grasp, while he waited for the elves to finish with their feast and drop the barrels through the trapdoor.

 

The world falling out from under him jolted Bilbo back to wakefulness and it was only the mechanism’s noise which drowned out his surprised scream as he dropped straight down in darkness to begin the wildest and most terrifying ride of his life. After the days which followed, Bilbo completely swore off any sort of water deeper or with more current than his own bathtub.


	9. Fiasco

Bilbo Baggins was not a happy hobbit, not one tiny little bit. He’d left ‘happy’ behind long ago, sometime _after_ he recovered from his river-induced cold, and was edging rather quickly towards vexed with each and every passing day though he genuinely did try not to take it out on his friends. They’d _all_ truly tried to care for him when he had been sick, none so more than Thorin himself though Balin and Óin were very close in the count, and Bilbo had appreciated the overbearing presence of a gaggle of dwarves always being underfoot at the time. Only, now he was perfectly recovered, thank you very much, and the situation he found himself in very much grated on his nerves. Words such as ‘forward-thinking’ and ‘discreet’ didn’t really come to mind when dealing with a pack of dwarves, so Bilbo couldn’t really blame them for the problem even if at times he wanted only to throttle the offending dwarf or shove a few dwarves into Lake-Town’s canals.

                                                                           

The reason behind his frayed nerves and lack of generous spirit was, as it usually proved to be- Thorin. Well, only as the reason and not as the fault this time, Bilbo had to generously concede. Bilbo had been trying, for the entirety of their stay now, to get the dwarf alone for a few minutes so that he could give him his long-overdue gem. Only, now they seemed to have a surplus of dwarves, and before Bilbo could get three words out someone – Balin and Dwalin were the worst offenders, though the other ten certainly made their presence known – managed to intrude, either singly or in multiples. Their reasons were impossibly varied, and led Bilbo to believe that they were genuine; he’d never seen his dwarves carry out a single deception where they weren’t as obvious about it as a tween scrumping illicit apples from an orchard. The dwarves weren’t being rude about their interruption, either – they were always polite enough to wait far enough back so as not to make Bilbo feel rushed – but once they joined in conversation with Thorin, it took _hours_ before they finished even when Bilbo participated in an attempt to make their interruption pass quicker. If, by some miracle, one finished his business quickly and left, another one popped up with another discussion. Bilbo quickly learned how to deal with the entire situation so that he didn’t spend entire days grinding his teeth with the effort of keeping sharp words held behind them.

 

All in all, Bilbo would get Thorin alone, try to speak to him, and when the inevitable shadow arrived, he’d break away and take himself elsewhere to stew in his frustration. He did notice that Thorin began to throw him baffled, and then worried, looks as it went on, but Bilbo considered those a much better trade than the sheer fury he’d get if he actually did carry out trying to drown any of Thorin’s dwarves.

 

Their last day in Lake-Town, Bilbo rose earlier than usual and ducked into their borrowed house’s kitchen to throw together a bit of last night’s food as his first breakfast- a couple of rolls stuffed with the spiced beef suited him just fine and would hold him over until more dwarves awoke in time for second breakfast. He was startled to see that he wasn’t the only soul awake at this hour, and grinned with warm delight upon spying Thorin’s unmistakable form at the large bank of eastern windows.

 

“Good morning!” he greeted happily, and caught his breath when the sunrise’s warm colors blazed across Thorin’s face as he turned to return the greeting. Fascinated by the play of light, and its effect of softening the hard lines of worry on the dwarf’s face, Bilbo completely missed what words were said, though he still smiled at the welcoming tone. It was only when Thorin’s hand came to rest on the edge of his shoulder, concerned at the lack of reaction, that he realized he’d been staring. “Oh! Terribly sorry, must not be fully awake,” Bilbo babbled to cover his lapse and mentally kicked himself even as he wondered _what_ in the green world had come over him.

 

A presence appeared at Bilbo’s left shoulder and, without looking, he could immediately identify the dwarf- Dwalin. Bilbo’s head thunked forward to rest against the morning-cool window glass and he closed his eyes against his mounting frustration. “Why-,” he started to ask, and then cut off that incredibly rude question. He couldn’t ask _why_ Dwalin was bothering them, even if that’s exactly what wanted to escape his mouth.

 

Bilbo gave them both a stiff smile and polite nod, and then escaped out the front door to wander down to a little sheltered and solitary hiding place he’d found a week ago. They wouldn’t be leaving until midday, something about the rowers not wanting to fight the morning currents, and he had time to get his emotions back under control before frustration got the better of him.

 

He sat in silence and watched dark water lap at the pilings as he let the soothing sight lull him as it had for so many days now. So deep was he in avoiding thought that he missed light footsteps and startled badly when a large body sat down next to his on the pier.

 

“Peace, friend, I didn’t intend to catch you unawares,” the person apologized, and Bilbo quickly recognized the intruder as Bard. He’d made a fast friend in the bowman as they met several times during Bilbo’s frustrated wandering and both appreciated the other’s quick wit and intellect. “Do you wish to talk about whatever has driven you to hiding again?”

 

“It won’t make much difference now,” Bilbo complained and then stopped himself. He couldn’t take his ill humor out on a friend who only ever tried to help and so tried to speak again. The only problem Bilbo found is that every time he opened his mouth to start to speak, only inarticulate noises escaped.

 

Bard chuckled at his dilemma and Bilbo couldn’t help but join in as he could see the humor in his situation even through the irritation, and it helped him relax enough that the entire story spilled out in a more or less coherent stream. He told of trying to catch Thorin alone to speak with him about a personal matter, and failing at it; of trying to _fabricate_ moments where they would be alone to speak, and miserably failing at it. He’d even stalked the other dwarves to make sure that they were busy before he tried to isolate Thorin for a few stolen moments alone, only to be thwarted in the end. By the end of his explanation turned diatribe, Bard was absolutely _howling_ with laughter and Bilbo seriously gave thought to shoving his friend into the water below. Bard wasn’t a dwarf, he could swim, and Bilbo was… well, he was mostly sure that the man wouldn’t take great offense at the abrupt dunking.

 

The man must have read the threat in Bilbo’s face, for he worked hard to contain his mirth enough to speak. “My friend, I have been in your situation before, and found it no less frustrating,” he managed around gasping for breath.

 

Bilbo gave his friend the benefit of the doubt and they both remained sitting, safely on the dock and dry, until Bard had recovered enough to speak without interrupting himself every few words. He gave his friend a pointed look which prompted him to get on with it.

 

“When I was courting my wife, one of her brothers would always shadow us to chaperone. After three months of never having a moment alone, even Bryn was about ready to kill them to earn a little peace.” Bard gave him a knowing look which made Bilbo’s face and ears heat in a blush. He could only stammer and trip over his own tongue as he issued half-hearted denials of Bard’s claim.

 

“No, Bilbo, you may try to deny it, but I’ve watched the two of you. Thorin watches you as if everything you do is the most fascinating thing he’s ever seen, though he tries to hide it from you. And _you_ , my friend, you watch Thorin as if he’s the biggest puzzle that you’ve ever faced, and you can’t wait to solve him.”

 

That was too much for Bilbo to remain silent. “I certainly have _not_!” he sputtered with indignation. “I’ve simply been trying to figure out how to talk to him, and why all the dwarves suddenly need to keep interrupting.” Bilbo turned away from Bard to avoid seeing the man’s teasing grin and caught a flash of dark hair ducking behind a barrel. He blinked in confusion but was distracted as Bard’s next words dragged him back into the dratted discussion.

 

“I still don’t buy your excuse, though it sounds like you’ve fairly well convinced yourself of it. You’re even worse than Bryn and I before we started courting, though I doubt that you’ve ever pulled Thorin’s hair or put mud down his shirt,” Bard mused. “Even when we were courting, Bryn and I still had our problems, and not just with trying to dodge her brothers long enough to steal a kiss or two. I fought with my doubts about why she bothered to agree to my courtship, as her family are merchants of some wealth while all I have to offer is a failed bloodline to a dead city.”

 

Bilbo frowned at him in puzzlement. “If you had doubts, why did you ask to court her in the first place?”

 

“We grew up together here, and even as small children she always had my attention. When we became of age, she just… she took my breath away,” Bard explained with a faraway look in his eye and a fond smile. “She still does, even though her hair has more grey in it now, but I still wonder every day that she chose _me_. Bryn calls me a silly idiot because of it,” he laughed. “It’s also how I know what to look for in you and Thorin, my friend, no matter what words you try to hide behind.”

 

His friend was truly wise and Bilbo had to admit, even just to himself, that all his procrastinating over Thorin’s gem wasn’t exactly because he couldn’t find the perfect moment to give it to the dwarf. He hadn’t been brave enough to name the reason why, but the two of them had been circling each other for quite a while. Bilbo opened his mouth to reply when he was knocked into Bard’s lap and nearly off the dock itself by two heavy bodies tumbling into him.

 

Shrieks and yells followed the frightening actions, and as soon as his feet were on steady wood, Bilbo crept to peer over the edge only to glare as he clapped eyes on the impertinent intruders. There, treading cold water and looking far too much like drowned cats, were two dwarves who had absolutely no reason to be anywhere near Bilbo’s hiding place. Bard kindly helped fish them out of the lake and Bilbo met them, arms crossed irately and foot only barely restrained from tapping.

 

“Just what do you boys think you were doing? You could have hurt yourselves, or someone else, with your foolishness!” he scolded, and was pleased to see their satisfied expressions droop into distress.

 

“We saw you run off earlier, Bilbo, and wanted to make sure that you were safe,” Kíli started.

 

“So we followed you and hid. And then _he_ ,” Fíli pointed at an entirely too amused Bard who leaned back against the house behind them, “made you angry so we stayed to rescue you!”

 

“Only, I slipped, and Fíli grabbed tried to grab me, and then we both fell,” Kíli finished.

 

Bilbo closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose as he sighed. The boys meant well even if their execution of it left much to be desired. Truly, it was a miracle that they had lived this long without getting killed. He abruptly reached up to grab each dwarf by the earlobe, getting a firm pinch even as both squirmed and tried to break free, and turned his head back to speak with the man behind him. “Thank you for fishing them out of the lake, Bard, but now I’ve got to take these two children back before one of their accidents manages to sink the town.”

 

The two friends parted with a smile, and Bilbo headed off back to their borrowed home with a spring in his step and a chorus of yelps and moans following him. He knew how to deal with idiotic younglings, and the boys still had a league to go if they wanted to top some of his cousins! Besides, he had a dwarf to see to and a truth to stop hiding from; Bilbo smiled to himself as his chest warmed with happiness. Yes, he certainly did have a dwarf to see to, whether it was here or on the trail.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As Lake-Town names were taken from the Norse, I borrowed Bryn from Brynhildr, a Valkyrie from the poetic eddas (from where Tolkien pulled many of his names). Movie daughter Sigrid *could* be named for the Valkyrie Sigrdrífa.


	10. Cobalt

Bilbo hissed in pain as someone jostled his feet in the dark, and a sheepish-sounding Fíli whispered an apology. Even when whispered at the distance of only a finger’s breadth from his ear, Bilbo still could barely hear it above the din of Smaug’s infuriated roars outside. Finally, mercifully, the din faded as if the dragon moved off from their collapsed and now unhidden entrance into the mountain, and Bilbo could feel the tense bodies pressed against his own begin to slowly relax. There was a clattering of rock pieces somewhere to Bilbo’s right as it sounded like a dwarf stood to his feet in the rubble.

 

“Kíli, Glóin, go scout this tunnel and make sure it’s safe enough for us to hide in for a day or two in case that fiend comes for us from the inside,” Thorin’s voice ordered in the dark. “If it’s safe, bring back enough wood for a fire- Óin will want to see to us, and there’ll be no escaping him as handily as we did the dragon.”

 

Óin grumbled imprecations against Thorin even as the others snickered and noisily stood to spread out from their tight cluster. Bilbo tried to keep his damaged feet safely away while he marveled at the change in the entire company. They’d faced death in so many ways, faced hardships one after another as if their journey had been cursed from the beginning, and just been run inside the mountain’s secret entrance by a livid dragon; yet, for all of that, the dwarves sounded nearly euphoric to be back inside Erebor and Thorin had even made a small joke, something which, if asked two months ago, Bilbo would never have guessed the grimly driven dwarf capable of doing.

 

“Shouldn’t we move from here? If Smaug buried us, can’t he unbury us just as easily?” Bilbo asked with trepidation as the darkness pressed down on him and every slither of loose rock reminded him that there was a wall of rubble just to his left.

 

Bofur’s voice piped up from far closer than expected and drew a surprised gasp from Bilbo’s throat. “We’re perfectly safe where we are, if you’re asking about the rock. He brought down about three lengths of mountain behind us, and even that menace can’t tunnel through that much- did you see his claws? They’re built for cutting, not digging. No, he’s far more likely to try and roast us alive from the other end of this tunnel than he is to dig us out from the outside,” the dwarf cheerfully explained, and Bilbo wished that his feet didn’t hurt so abominably. He’d love to kick his friend for that lovely new worry.

 

“No, I didn’t look at his claws. I was looking at his teeth, and the flame, and the tunnel roof which was coming down upon my head. Next time I’m being killed by a dragon, though, I’ll be sure to examine his _toenails_ ,” Bilbo replied somewhat waspishly. Bofur only laughed in response, along with a few other dwarves, and Bilbo gave up thoughts of kicking them all. There was something _wrong_ with their sense of humor! The thought crossed his mind that he should use rocks to the head rather than kicking, to encourage the growth of common-sense, but then Bilbo banished that idea- many had taken rocks to the head as the passage collapsed under furious strikes from the dragon’s tail, and yet none showed any signs of improvement. Or did he just need to try bigger rocks to get through their thick dwarven skulls?

 

Bilbo’s musings were cut short by warm light presaging the return of Kíli and Glóin, and he whole-heartedly welcomed the glorious return of sight. Even his most outlandish musings weren’t enough to keep the gnawing fears at bay for long in the insidious dark. It pressed in and magnified even the smallest fear into a heart-pounding terror.

 

Kíli dumped his massive armload of wood and then held the torch, fashioned from what looked like a table leg, while Glóin arranged everything to his satisfaction. “This corridor goes on for about six lengths, and turns twice,” he reported to Thorin as he stood with the torch. “We didn’t see any other rooms or doors cut into it, but after it opens up into the main passages there are rooms; it’s where we found the furniture to break up for the fire. Wouldn’t you rather camp in one of the rooms, Uncle? They’re still so beautiful!” Kíli enthused.

 

Thorin immediately shook his head. “Here will be safer, if the beast comes for us through the inside of the mountain.”

 

“Excuse me, but why is it safer?” Bilbo had to ask, as he’d much prefer a proper room with four solid walls to a rubble-strewn corridor with a collapsed section at one end. The rock still tumbling down and settling did not instill confidence in his heart that the rest of the corridor wouldn’t suddenly decide to squish them all into messy, and no doubt painful, deaths.

 

Rather than Thorin, it was Glóin who answered as he sat back from his successfully lit fire and tucked his much-dented tinderbox back under his beard. “It’s because of the fire, lad. With the corridor sealed like this, it traps the air inside it. If that menace tries to blast his fire at us from the other end, then the flames won’t want to go around the corners, and the air will back up at our end so that we can still breathe. That thing’s too stupid to trickle flame up the corridor, to burn the air out like a lovingly-tended forge can, so we’ll be safer here than in a pretty room where we’re vulnerable.”

 

A few other dwarves nodded, and Bilbo assumed that they had closely worked with flame enough to know its properties. “Now lads, enough discussion- talk won’t close those cuts. If your noses fall off due to wound rot because you were too tender to let me stitch you to keep out the dirt, then don’t come weeping to me when you cannot find a mate!” Óin chivvied them into action with his own version of affection, and Bilbo freely grinned at his friends’ sudden hunted expressions. For being a pack of tough dwarves, they certainly were squeamish about being tended to!

 

“Bilbo, you’re over here first. I want to look at those feet again and see what mischief you’ve done those blisters by running on them.”

 

Obligingly, Fíli and Kíli helped Bilbo move over closer to the fire by picking him up between them, but did not place his feet directly facing it. They scattered clear of the healer just as soon as they could, though, as if afraid that he’d trap them into having their wounds treated. Óin motioned for him to sit with it to his side, to keep the heat safely away, and he was grateful for that consideration- his feet felt hotter than a fresh bed warmer. “Dwalin grabbed me, actually, when the mountainside came down and carried me in,” he admitted while Óin tutted over the blistered burns which wrapped around the backs and bottoms of his feet.

 

Normally Bilbo would have railed against being picked up and carried like a child, but he’d been sitting down when Smaug appeared in the air over their ledge, and then he’d just _frozen_ in horrified panic. The rest of the dwarves had been closer to the hidden doorway and had darted inside, expecting him to follow, but Bilbo had been stuck sitting on his rock even as the dragon’s belly began to glow ominously brighter and only Dwalin’s arm around his middle had shifted him. The dwarf grabbed, tucked Bilbo against his side, and then pelted for the door which Nori held open. They nearly didn’t make it. Tongues of flame had followed inside to lick around the stone door’s edges as it slammed closed to leave them in impenetrable darkness. And then the world fell in.

 

Óin gave him as frank a look as Bilbo had ever received from the dwarf. “You may owe Dwalin your feet, Bilbo. We don’t have enough water in our skins for me to have cleaned your feet properly, had you run on them and ground filth deep into broken blisters, and my tinctures were still down on the ponies. By now, that beast will have either eaten them or panicked them clear to the Iron Hills, so I couldn’t treat the rot which would inevitably set in,” he explained, and Bilbo shivered. With their situation, such festering wounds could cost a limb, or a life.

 

“But they’re not that bad?” he asked anxiously as he tried to get a good look at one of his heels in the flickering light. Óin grabbed the top of his ankle to stop his nervous twisting, before his calves completely slipped off the small boulder on which they were propped for examination.

 

“I stuffed my pockets with that burn paste the men gave us before we left the ponies, given that you were going down to see about a dragon and I didn’t trust the thing to have had the decency to die before we arrived. It won’t work as quickly as a salve of my own, but give it two days and you’ll be walking again- those blisters on your soles haven’t developed any further, thank all for tough hobbit feet, but it’ll take longer for the burns on the backs of your feet to heal. Your skin’s more delicate there and the burns set in deeper. They won’t stop you from walking, but you’ll need to take care and keep them clean and covered.” Óin dumped one of the tins into Bilbo’s lap and motioned for him to remain seated where he was. “I have infants to stitch up before they decide to get themselves lost, dragon or no, so you stay there and I’ll send someone over to spread that paste on your feet.”

 

Bilbo outright laughed at Óin’s words, and received a cheeky smile in return- the healer wasn’t half as grumpy as he played up, but he did have to out-stubborn his patients more often than not, and that required a very _forceful_ show of personality. He enjoyed the fire at his back and tried to forget the fire in his feet as he watched dwarves scatter away from the approaching healer. Óin bellowed Dwalin’s name, and the intimidating warrior actually shrunk into himself as he was cornered and subjected to a thorough inspection. Bilbo wondered if all dwarves were so vehemently opposed to seeking a healer’s aid, or if his twelve dwarves were simply special in that regard. It all seemed rather… self-defeating for a race who thrived on risk – battle, tunneling riches out of the ground, tending forges capable of rendering bone to ash – to avoid a healer when soured wounds could easily claim a life.

 

His musings were abruptly interrupted as a large shape dropped to the ground by his feet. Bilbo twitched and chided himself for losing track of everyone.

 

“Didn’t mean to startle you,” Dwalin rumbled by way of apology as he held one large hand out for the tin which Bilbo still cradled in his lap.

 

Madly hoping that his embarrassed flush couldn’t be seen above the fire’s tint, Bilbo surrendered the tin and mumbled that it was quite alright. He noticed that Dwalin had a closed gash among shallower cuts and scrapes on the outside bend of his left elbow, which looked like it had to have been caused by a heavy sharp rock, and stared. He’d been carried on Dwalin’s left, which meant that he’d been shielded by that arm, and that his own lack of scratches, gouges, gashes, and dirt ground into open blisters was due to this dwarf; this dwarf who was now spreading the pine-smelling burn paste over his burned feet so gently that Bilbo could only feel where his fingers were by the sensation of the cooler paste against his blazing skin.

 

“Thank you,” Bilbo managed to whisper around the sudden frog of emotion in his throat. He shoved down the swell of emotion at the realization of how protected he’d been as this certainly wasn’t the time.

 

Dwalin looked up at him briefly and waved the hand holding the tin. “Don’t thank me till I’m done, Master Baggins. Fingers aren’t as deft as Óin’s, and may still end up poking you,” he dismissed.

 

Bilbo stretched to lightly grasp Dwalin’s wrist and catch his attention. “No, I mean _thank you_ , Master Dwalin. For carrying me in when I couldn’t move, for protecting me from the falling stone, and for this even if you do end up poking me,” he smiled gently and received a ghost of an answering smile through the dwarf’s tense concentration in return. He released the wrist he held to let Dwalin finish spreading the paste, and if he was poked two or three times, Bilbo never twitched so much as a toe to let Dwalin know about it.

 

That night, or what the dwarves called night since Bilbo couldn’t sense the passage of time within the mountain in the same way that they claimed they could, they all bedded down as best they could. Bilbo and Dori, whose shoulder had been badly wrenched by a large section of falling ceiling while he shielded his brothers, were exempt from the exercise, but everyone else had been conscripted to brush the corridor floor free of debris. Even Thorin joined in to crouch down and use his outer tunic as a broom to tidily sweep pebbles and heavier rock dust back towards the collapsed section; Bilbo was actually rather impressed by the dwarf’s unexpected handiness with such a menial task.

 

As he turned to shake out his tunic and slip it back on, Thorin caught Bilbo’s eye and smirked as if he’d read the hobbit’s astonishment. Bilbo promptly looked everywhere but at the dwarf, mind still whirling with Bard’s revelation. He wasn’t exactly _averse_ to the idea of courtship, exactly, but he didn’t know what to do with one as he’d never before had any offers. Bilbo was saved an awkward, at least on his part, encounter by Bombur’s booming call that the area was sufficiently cleared to sleep on.

 

Everyone looked to his own bedding – usually a tunic or jacket wadded up in place of a pillow – and they all quickly dropped off to sleep after the exhausting day. Thorin declined to set a watch rotation that night, as there were no dangers in Erebor other than the dragon, and his racket would rouse them all should he decide to try burning them in the night. Dragons weren’t exactly known for their stealth, after all.

 

Bilbo waited while the snores around him evened and deepened. The emotion in his chest, impatient as ever, pushed at him and made the inside corners of his eyes prickle but he remained still and quiet where he lay near the fire, legs propped up on a small boulder over which Thorin had insisted on spreading his folded cloak to act as padding. Only once Bilbo was certain, absolutely certain, that all his dwarves were asleep did he turn his head away from the fire, loosen his control over the emotion, and let it have its way.

 

The warm squeeze in his chest was still his favorite feeling in the world, for it meant that he _felt_ and Bilbo didn’t think that he’d ever lose his wonder over the return of his tears, or his gratitude to the dwarves who prompted it. The tear dripped, liquid, from his eye and crystallized as it slipped down his cheek before it dropped into his waiting hand. Bilbo froze as he listened for any sounds from the dwarves, but no cry of surprise or covert shuffle met his sensitive ears. He twisted to surreptitiously examine his little gem in the firelight.

 

It was such a dark blue in the dim light that if Bilbo didn’t know better he would have called it black, like the darkest blue of his mother’s treasured cobalt glass figurines which now sat in his Aunt Mirabella’s front windowsill. But as the fire’s varying light shifted through it, little sparkles of lighter blue briefly flared to life, like the moon bugs which came out during summer nights in the Shire. Aware that he could spend all night watching the fascinating reaction, Bilbo carefully tucked the gem away in his little bag, careful not to clink together any of the bag’s contents lest he disturb a sleeping dwarf. He nestled the bag against the skin of his chest again, where Thorin’s gem could rest near his heart despite his own bewildered reaction to the dwarf’s potential budding courtship, and let his exhaustion sweep him off to sleep.

 

Morning brought empty stomachs, stiffened limbs, and complaining dwarves. Thorin ordered all the dwarves out in two groups, Bilbo hid a smile as he imagined Thorin only doing so to avoid all the grousing and whining that had been done as everyone hauled sore bodies off the unforgiving stone floor. One group was led by Thorin and they were to go to the left down the wide passage at the end of their corridor in search of anything usable – any tapestries that survived the century of neglect which they could use as mattresses or any of the long-term food stores which Thorin believed could be nearby. He had been very young when Erebor was lost, but dwarves did keep emergency stores in case of famine which even a century of neglect wouldn’t touch, if water or air did not breach the seals on their casks. The other group was to head right under the leadership of Fíli up the passage in search of more furniture to use as firewood. From Glóin’s report, much of the more delicate craftsmanship had dry rotted to unusable crumbly shards, but there should still be stout pieces to find and break apart. It went without saying that both groups were to be as silent as possible lest their resident dragon hear their forays and come to incinerate them.

 

Bilbo was quick to request of Óin that Dwalin remain behind to help him with the paste and his feet, as the dwarf had done such a wonderful job the day before. Óin gave him a discerning look, and Bilbo remembered that the canny healer carried one of his gems and could possibly suss the reason for his request, but only nodded in acceptance of the request. After Dwalin’s stitches were checked for tell-tale inflammation, he was pointed in Bilbo’s direction and twelve dwarves split up to carry out their assigned tasks.

 

As they went through the painful ritual of wiping down his feet with a clean cloth from Bombur’s pack – which was the only pack to be dropped in the corridor the first time they dashed inside of it to hide from Smaug – Bilbo dug out the little gem. His actions didn’t go unnoticed and Dwalin looked up from his gentle, but agonizing, work with a questioning look. “Need something?” he asked.

 

“Nope, but I wish to give _you_ something.” Bilbo held out his hand and waited until Dwalin had secured both the cloth and nearly empty skin of precious water before he laid the gem into the warrior’s outstretched hand. The sheer size of that hand made the little gem seem smaller than any of the others, though Bilbo knew it to be of average size.

 

“And what’s this little beauty for, Master Baggins? I don’t recognize it as dwarf-hewn,” Dwalin seemed just as entranced by its odd short-lived flaring sparkles as Bilbo had been the night before.

 

Bilbo launched into a version of the now very familiar explanation. He ended with, “They’re a secret kept to my people, but it’s still given in honest friendship.”

 

Dwalin watched him thoughtfully, looking back down to the gem in his hand at times. “I’ll not poke about another’s secrets, Ma- Bilbo, but may I ask how hobbits treat _their_ gems? If they’re that important to your people, I’d not want to offend, even by accident.”

 

Thinking quickly, Bilbo pictured his parents, and his cousins. He didn’t have many gems of his own, and had lost the ability before any of it had become an issue to deal with, but his family had adored each and every one of theirs. “Some are kept out of sight, private even from the eyes of our own people, but some are mounted in jewelry and worn proudly in plain sight for all to see. Gems of friendship are usually worn thus, as they say about the wearer that he or she is one to trust and befriend. Because I’ve broken one of the rules of my people, I would ask that you please do not display your gem, or if you do, please do not disclose what it actually is. It is your gem and I would never dream of telling you what to do with it, but that is what I ask in the name of our friendship.” Bilbo’s heart pounded as he trusted this information to Dwalin, more than he’d ever revealed to any of the other dwarves, and perilously close to breaking the most sacred of rules for a hobbit. The gems were a gift, and he truly could _not_ bring himself to demand that Dwalin hide it away, just as he could not truly lie when asked the very innocent, well-intentioned, and yet too pointed question. Oh, by sweet Yavanna he’d love for the dwarf to hide it away as the others had done, safely out of sight, but he could never demand. It simply wasn’t his place to do so.

 

Dwalin thought a moment longer and then reached back to dig into his left boot and withdraw a small leather pouch. It had been seared with the angular runes of the dwarves’ language, and Dwalin carefully dropped the gem into it before he tied the strings tightly to close it and shoved it deep into his boot again. “Once we retake Erebor and start the great forges once more, I’ll make a pendant mount for it so that I can wear it as your people do, but I will do as you ask and keep it out of sight by wearing it under my clothes.”

 

Bilbo nodded, as that was the best compromise that he could hope for, and it truly did gladden his heart to know that at least one gem would have a proper mount even if it was never displayed like it should be. But, others would ask questions if one or two dwarves displayed their unusual gems, and then that could put the entire Shire in jeopardy again. Dwalin appeared to hesitate.

 

“I would ask that you do something for me, in the name of friendship, but only if you wished to,” he asked and grimaced as whatever he thought to ask appeared to weigh heavily on him.

 

“You may ask anything you wish without judgment, and if I wish to decline then I shall do so without thinking any less of you for the asking,” Bilbo was quick to reassure. Dwalin wasn’t the kind to ask frivolous favors of him, wasn’t the kind of dwarf for _frivolous_ anything of any kind at all, and so Bilbo was more than willing to listen.

 

“I would ask that you consider giving Thorin’s offer of courtship a chance.” He continued before Bilbo could rally a rebuttal. “Something must have happened in Lake-Town, because you’ve gone all kinds of skittish around him when once you were happy to be close, but his offer is genuine and not a passing fancy.” Dwalin warred with himself before he spoke again. “I’ve been by his side since I was old enough to hold a short-axe, and he’s never taken up with someone the way he has with you. I think it scared him, in the beginning, but you stuck with us and didn’t let him chase you away, and then you gave him the grandest courtship opening offer that’s been seen since Durin the fourth joined with men and elves in the Last Alliance.”

 

“I don’t know what that means,” Bilbo managed to state, though his voice was rather faint with shock.

 

Dwalin simply gave him a look which implied that Bilbo was being intentionally dense. “He joined the war to impress his intended and give her such a mighty opening offer that no other suitor could hope to best it. When he came back to Khazad-Dûm after the war she accepted his courtship, of course, as he’d dedicated his units to her name and honor. You did the same for Thorin when you moved to attack Azog after killing the orc that was threatening his life. Had you only killed the first orc and then let us help, it wouldn’t have been an offer. But you killed the threat and then made Thorin’s enemy your own, fought his battle when he could not and stood for his life; _that_ , Bilbo, was a courtship offering.”

 

Dazedly, Bilbo noticed that his feet had been slathered in paste while he was distracted by Dwalin’s words, and he hadn’t felt a single thing. His mind whirled and his heart tripped along as memories, emotions, and thoughts tumbled together in his head like a pack of puppies. “I will consider it,” he heard himself murmur as Dwalin looked at him expectantly and was neither shocked by his decision nor unhappy with it. He honestly didn’t know what to feel.

 

Perhaps sensing his confusion, Dwalin left him alone and seated himself further down the corridor to keep watch for the others when they returned.

 

Bilbo had much to think on, but fate wouldn’t give him much time in which to do it. His soles were already healing, and he didn’t know that there was yet a greater danger hiding in the mountain than the dragon.


	11. Blueberry

Bilbo didn’t think that his waistline would ever be the same. He’d started this journey as a properly plump hobbit, with his middle beginning to round out just right for one coming into his best years. Their months spent traveling, often on foot, and the exertions his poor body had been put to saw that middle melt down until precious few reserves remained between skin on the outside and bone on the inside. He tried not to think about what other hobbits would say, tried not to imagine the look of shock on their faces, if they saw him in his current state- he was almost _thin_. Hobbits had learned the hard way that thin meant vulnerability, for should another time of privation come, the thin always died first. The Fell Winter had taught him that lesson personally as he’d watched a cadre of young Goodbody faunts, bare weanlings all and none old enough to yet carry the protective pads of fat that they’d have developed in a few short years, shrivel and fall fatally still as their tiny bodies tried to save them from the starvation. The sleep only bought them an extra day and then his little cousins, several times removed, were gone. Bilbo hadn’t had time to properly grieve as their deaths were soon eclipsed by the deaths of his parents, and then he hadn’t felt much of anything after _that_.

 

This, however… this situation truly took the cake! They’d survived the orcs which had hunted them at every turn, goblins that wished to torture and eat them, gigantic spiders of horrifying proportions which wanted to hang them up and suck the juices out of their still-living bodies, and a dragon’s furious rampage. They may not, in the end, survive Thorin’s descent into madness and intellect-numbing _greed_. No provisions from Erebor’s stores had lasted through the dragon’s occupation- that section of the mountain had been brought down in the creature’s eagerness to strip Erebor of its golden decorations. Even the railings had been stripped from the walkways, leaving them with sheer drops and more than a few were crumbled beyond hope as the stone had given way in the face of the beast’s rough greed.

 

Fourteen mouths depended on the food which had been stored in Bombur’s pack, and in the rescued packs which Fíli and Kíli had dashed outside to retrieve once the crow confirmed Smaug’s death at the hands of Bard. Their ponies had either been eaten or fled, for there was no sign of them other than great scorch marks near where they’d been picketed, but their small campsite under a rocky overhang had escaped the dragon’s notice. Unfortunately, many of their provisions were still on the ponies as they were never expecting to camp below. Thorin’s grand plan had seemed to consist of dealing with the dragon and then bringing them into the stables through the front gates.

 

Thorin. Oh, how Bilbo would love to shake that dwarf until his bones rattled and some sense shook loose! Right now, Bilbo was ever so thankful that he hadn’t given the gold-hungry two-legged dragon his gem: Thorin was abusing all sense of friendship, and it even appeared as if courtship had been pushed far out of the dwarf’s mind in favor of hoarding his gold. Thoughts of food certainly had been.

 

Their meager supply of food was dwindling fast, and rather than being rational about trading over a share of the treasure with the men for food and reparations, Thorin had _refused_. Bard tried several times to reach an accord then, wisely, gave up and challenged Thorin to eat the gold he was so unwilling to give up. No food would enter the mountain through the blockade of men and elves and fourteen were consigned to a slow starvation through the greedy intractable actions of one dwarf.

 

They had plenty of water as the River Running originated in the mountain, so Bombur did his best with ever-thinning soups. They used the liquid to fill up the empty spaces in their bellies, and spices to trick the tongue. Two wafers of cram per pot of soup were boiled until they fell apart, to act as a thickener, and then one piece of dried meat was cut as finely as possible so that they would all get a few flakes floating in their bowls. Along their journey, Bifur had collected and secreted away greens in his packs, and he’d offered those for the pot as well. Not a single one of them was choosy enough to refuse his generosity- hunger made the grasses and flowers palatable to even the pickiest dwarf.

 

Bilbo knew what he had to do, had known what he had to do once Thorin returned with Bard’s ultimatum, but he shivered uncontrollably every time he thought about it. Thorin had become absolutely crazed about the Arkenstone, the same stone which weighed heavily in Bilbo’s pocket and on his conscience. Tonight, Bilbo decided as he stared morosely into his empty bowl, tonight he had to carry out his plan or there wouldn’t be anything left to save- they only had one wafer of cram and a handful of dried flowers left for tomorrow’s soup. After that, there would be only water to slake their hunger, and that could fool a starving belly for only so long.

 

Movement at his side had Bilbo jumping guiltily, and he nearly dropped his bowl in fright.

 

“I didn’t mean to startle you, Master Baggins,” Bombur apologized as he settled his girth beside Bilbo’s at the fire. They were the only two left; the others had either retired to their bedrolls or been dragged back down to the treasury with Thorin to continue looking for the Arkenstone.

 

Bilbo waved off the apology and set his bowl on the floor. As his heart had jumped, so had his headache, to pound along in echo with the beat, and he reached up to rub at his temples in a futile effort to soothe it. Between the strain of Thorin’s uncertain temperament and their situation, and the onset of starvation, Bilbo’s poor head had suffered for days. He jerked, nerves fizzling and popping, when a hand landed on his shoulder.

 

Bombur peered at him worriedly. “You don’t look well, and don’t try to wave me off this time. You haven’t looked well for a while,” the dwarf gave Bilbo a narrow and assessing look which reminded the hobbit that, jovial as he may be, Bombur still possessed the keen eyes and mind of his people. “I think that you lied to me, a bit, when you said that your reserves would get you through this. I think that they were nearly gone before we even got to the mountain.”

 

The words fell onto Bilbo nearly as physical hits and he cringed back a bit, only stopped by the hand still gently grasping his shoulder. “I… well…” Bilbo sputtered, very much caught in the lie that he’d told. He sighed heavily and decided to confess, as the little lie wouldn’t matter much in the face of what he planned to do later.

 

“Yes, well, I did fib a bit about that. With Thorin so concerned about finding the Arkenstone there wasn’t any reason to worry anyone, and we’re all hungry,” Bilbo admitted.

 

“I don’t think that’s the entire reason, though I believe you not wanting to worry anyone.” Bombur shoved his own bowl, miraculously still filled with his ration of thin soup, into Bilbo’s surprised hands. “I watched you tonight, and waited, and you’re going to eat this. That headache’s the worst it’s been in days, and your hands are actually trembling now, so don’t even argue with me.”

 

Bilbo looked down in astonishment to discover that Bombur was right- the hand he held up did tremble, though he couldn’t tell if it was from hunger or the terror of what he planned to do that night. He considered refusing the bowl, as it was far too generous to accept, but one look at Bombur’s stubbornly set face decided the matter. Bilbo picked up the spoon and began to shove lukewarm soup into his mouth, faster as his stomach realized that more food was forthcoming and began to gnaw at him. Once the bowl was empty, guilt returned and he could barely look up into Bombur’s eyes as he handed the bowl back.

 

“Now, don’t you be doing any of that! I’ve far more reserves than you, enough for three hobbits, and I won’t have you feeling bad about what I gave as a gift, Master Baggins,” he scolded. Bombur patted his own girth when Bilbo looked up, and they shared a moment of mirth as the dwarf truly did carry enough weight for any three or four hobbits. In the Shire, his size and appetite would have been met with glee, at least until his lack of table manners were demonstrated.

 

Bombur rose to collect Bilbo’s bowl for cleaning before he headed to his own bedroll, as the dwarf had the late watch that night. Bilbo remained to stare morosely into the fire though his belly now gurgled happily away at the second helping. Without warning, a sob caught in his throat and shook his entire body. Bilbo curled into himself, face pressed to his knees and arms wrapped tightly around them, as the emotion ripped through him with the force of a springtime storm. After the tension, the fear, the hunger, Bombur’s incredible kindness was more than he could withstand and he was so very thankful that he was alone- he couldn’t have held back the tear even had there been orcs in front of him.

 

When the crash and twist and tangle of emotion had passed and his shudders calmed to an occasional hiccup, Bilbo lifted his head and released the bruising hold he had on his legs. Caught in the folds of his trousers sat a little gem, dark where it was shadowed against the fire’s light. He picked up with fingers which now trembled with fatigue from the emotion’s release, and held it up to see the little wonder. In the light, it positively _glowed_ as if it contained a miniature copy of the fire inside of itself. Bilbo also chuckled, as the light made it turn a medium blue which resembled a ripe blueberry, so very perfect for Bombur that Bilbo couldn’t have imagined a more suitable gem. Yavanna truly did bless her creatures, he marveled as he clasped the gem and stood to find the dwarf. With this tear, Bilbo would gain one last friend before he had to perform one of the worst actions that he’d ever done in his life, but it also reminded him that even amongst the most ugly of circumstances, beauty could still be found if one looked for it.

 

Bombur was easy enough to find, as he was sitting against the mountain’s fortified wall atop the gate. They didn’t really have to mount a guard, as the blockade was more than happy to let them peacefully starve to death without risking their own skins in battle, but Thorin still insisted upon it with a fervor which bordered on mania.

 

“Master Bombur, I don’t know how much longer any of us have, so I wish to give you this,” Bilbo passed over the gem and watched Bombur examine it in the gate’s torchlight. He gave his explanation about the gem while the dwarf stood, eyes closed and gem fisted tightly to his chest. Once he’d finished speaking, Bombur looked at him with no trace of his usual joviality.

 

“The others carry these gems.” It wasn’t a question, only a very flat statement, and Bilbo was left floundering as Bombur briefly closed his eyes again only to open them again moments later. “They do, and that’s why they’ve not gone as gold mad as Thorin has even though he’s dragged most of them off to dig through the treasure for that Arkenstone of his. I could feel it calling to me, pulling and whispering, even while I stayed up top with the fire and supplies, but it’s stopped now,” Bombur said with wonder coloring his voice. He held his gem up nearly to his nose and studied it.

 

“This isn’t a gem from the ground, Master- I’m sorry my friend, Bilbo. It _feels_ almost like a living thing, if that makes any sense, and not at all like a stone does.”

 

Bilbo squirmed uncomfortably at having his lie so baldly torn apart. He also didn’t know what to make of the dwarf’s claim about the gold madness- his stomach twisted at the thought that he could have saved Thorin if only. No, Bilbo hastily cut that thought off. This was no time for ‘if only’, and he had no proof that the gem in his bag would have helped the dwarf; instead, it might have only driven him to new heights of avarice, and Bilbo’s folly could have seen the Shire emptied just as the histories of old taught.

 

“Bombur, I have a favor to ask of you. A very large favor,” Bilbo asked instead of answering, and Bombur blinked at the sudden change in tone. He clasped his gem to his chest again, and nodded.

 

“I can guess at what you’re looking to do, and it’s far braver than anything that I’d dare.” He nodded at Bilbo’s right pocket, “I felt that when I sat next to you earlier, and it confirmed what I’d thought. If you’re holding on to it, then you have your reasons, and our leader hasn’t been in his right mind about this entire thing. I’m fat, not stupid, Bilbo,” Bombur dryly joked at Bilbo’s astounded look. “What this little gem tells me is that whatever it is, it’s tied to you, and you’re sick with worry, not greed. So I’ll say that I don’t feel well tonight, suppose dinner didn’t sit right with me, and I’ll ask if you’d be so kind as to take over the rest of my watch, my friend,” Bombur mimed a stomachache.

 

Bilbo surprised them both as he threw his arms around the dwarf and squeezed. The hug, though, was readily returned as Bombur’s embrace lifted him up onto the tip of his toes and squeezed the air from his lungs in one great whoosh. Despite his temporary inability to draw a full breath, Bilbo adored it and reveled in the rare contact until they both let go and stepped back.

 

“Now, don’t you be thanking me, Bilbo, as I have something of my own to ask in return- don’t come back once you’ve done what you intend. The rest of us will miss you something fierce, but Thorin’s gone beyond insane about that thing and he won’t recognize friend from foe over it. If you do what I think, then he may very well kill you when he finds out. We’re your friends, Bilbo, but we cannot fight our Prince once he’s set down an edict,” Bombur begged, and Bilbo nodded. He fully well intended to return and face Thorin’s wrath, and his justice, over what he planned to do- he still cared for the dwarf, even if that was something which escaped Thorin’s mind at the moment, and his own sense of honor wouldn’t allow him to abscond in the night without a trace like a true burglar. He would face the consequences of his actions, even to his own death, but he wouldn’t torment Bombur with that knowledge.

 

They parted and Bilbo sat atop the gate and watched the full moon move across the sky before he gathered up enough courage to carry through his plan. His insides shivered with terror the entire time that he walked through the other camp, but in the end, the deed was done and his fate was sealed.


	12. Spilled Crimson

Bilbo crushed two handfuls of Gandalf’s robes in fists which trembled and shook with the force of his silent sobs. Jagged emotion clogged his throat and threatened to cut off his air even as painful bands wrapped around his ribs and made every inhalation a battle. He could feel the wizard’s hand on his shoulder, still keeping him tucked safely into Gandalf’s side behind the screening bodies of Bard and Thranduil and out of _his_ sight, but right then Bilbo just couldn’t care.

 

He didn’t even care to notice that his tears were falling down Gandalf's robes to scatter among the gate’s paving stones. They were only red gems, after all, an outward mark of his heart’s agony and he couldn’t spare any concern over them when he felt as if his heart were being carved out of his chest. Even the instinctual press of keeping his secrets fell far short of the reality of his emotions, and their need to escape his body.

 

He’d followed his honor and returned to the dwarves after his trip to the camp, oh yes he had. He’d even admitted to his actions when Thorin demanded to know how the men had come by the Arkenstone; Bilbo may have been hired as a burglar, but he was ever honest, and that proved to be nearly fatal. Thorin, in his deranged covetousness for the Arkenstone, had grabbed Bilbo up by the throat and threatened to throw Bilbo down to the rocks far below the gate.

 

Bilbo had expected anger, expected hurt, but the hard-faced _hatred_ that he saw in the one who he had hoped to court had shattered his heart. Once he’d been tossed at Gandalf’s feet he’d barely managed to stammer out a faint plea to let the Arkenstone stand as his share of the treasure before the tears welled up and he willingly turned into Gandalf's shielding embrace.

 

That same large hand on his shoulder now urged him to move, and Bilbo woodenly followed the group of tall beings over the wall and back down to the camp below. Thorin’s most cutting words echoed in his ears over and over- _and no friendship of mine goes with him_. Bilbo stumbled where Gandalf directed him and only vaguely noted that he was in a tent of some kind once the sun stopped glaring into his sore eyes, though his head still continued to pound and his chest ached hollowly with every heartbeat.

 

He was helped up onto a man-sized cot, and at that he did protest. “It’s midday- I’m not tired enough to sleep!” he tried to yelp, though it came out as more of an indignant croak.

 

Gandalf poured a cup of water and pushed it into his hands. “You may not _wish_ to sleep, but you need to, my friend. You’ve only just regained your ability to feel and cry, and don’t give me that glare, Bilbo- I know full well what hobbits are capable of, what has been done to them in the past, and what their limits are before their ability breaks. Today has pushed you so very close to breaking your ability, permanently, and so you need to rest both your body and your mind.”

 

Bilbo tried to return the gentle smile which Gandalf gave him, and then somehow found himself being maneuvered into laying on the cot before he could think to protest. One large warm hand stroked gentle fingers down the side of his face from temple to the soft spot under his jaw, over and over, and Bilbo found his eyes closing at the surprisingly soothing feeling. Gandalf spoke again, though his voice was softer and sounded a bit odd, as if it contained an echo even when barely above a whisper. “Yavanna blessed her hobbits with hearts that rejoice at the smallest joy, but this world also cuts them so very deeply. Rest, my friend; rest and let sleep work its own kind of healing magic.”

 

Bilbo didn’t hear any more, as the soothing strokes and Gandalf’s low voice sent him off to the realm of sleep, where the wizard made sure that his pain couldn’t follow.

 

_-*-_

 

It didn’t take much at all, really, only Bombur looking to find his brother, and then the rest of the company followed one dwarf at a time after each other until twelve dwarves gathered at the top of the gate in a mirror of their positions earlier that day. They bunched together for solace as this was the first time that all twelve were together outside of meals- all other times Thorin had dragged half of their number off to the treasury in the fruitless search for that accursed stone.

 

“We should ‘a said something, stopped him,” Bofur lamented, and none bothered asking which _him_ Bofur meant- they all knew and carried the same burden in their hearts.

 

Dori rounded the cluster to stand beside Bofur and put his hand on the miner’s shoulder in comfort. “No matter how much we all desperately wanted to, none of us carries enough rank to stop Thorin. Not even Fíli and Kíli together could have swayed his hand from carrying out the penalty which he’d sworn in front of us not a week ago. Bilbo heard the vow and still came back to face the forfeit; it was his choice,” Dori finished brokenly, voice nearly a sob as even his fortitude failed in the face of his grief. He’d planned to offer Bilbo a place as side-family once their contracts were fulfilled and Erebor was fully theirs again, as the hobbit had more than proven the depth of his heart and friendship as he’d befriended the three brothers – Dori hadn’t been blind to Bilbo’s overtures to both Ori and Nori – but that idea was now nothing more than a lovely dream as Thorin’s banishment tore their friend from their presence.

 

Unashamed for their pride, the dwarves comforted each other as they mourned the loss of their friend and tears passed unremarked down cheeks. The strain of their journey coupled with Thorin’s madness and Bilbo's banishment saw them turn to others, even those who were not their brother or cousin, in search of a comforting hold and a bit of warmth. In this, they were united as one big family. The older warriors recognized this reaction, though it usually passed after a particularly harrowing battle, and they easily reached out to reel in the less sure younger ones when they pulled back.

 

It was Kíli whose keen eyes glanced over at just the right moment for a stray bit of sunlight to catch a glimmer of red, and it was incongruous enough to draw him out from under Dwalin’s comforting arm. His actions caught Fíli’s attention, and Fíli following his brother brought over the rest of the dwarves.

 

“Who broke a necklace up _here_?” Kíli asked in bafflement as he squatted down to poke a fingernail at the scattered red stones and fragments. Their imperfect, fractured, forms refracted oddly in the sun’s light as if they weren’t stones at all, but something masquerading as innocent stones.

 

Fíli curiously picked one up and immediately dropped it as if scalded, falling back onto his rump with shock. “I don’t know what those are, but they’re not from a necklace!” he yelped loudly and shook his hand before examining his fingertips. They looked perfectly normal, pale and calloused and dirty from where he hadn’t bothered to wash them. He looked from the stones to his fingers and back again a few times while the others waited. “It _hurt_ when I picked it up, but not the kind of hurt like grabbing up a hot coal or the edge of a blade. It felt like I was being torn apart somehow, inside…” Fíli made a vague motion to his chest.

 

Nori shared a pointed look with Ori. “Alright, little brother, you’ve always claimed that your gem sang to you, so what little ditty are these whistling?” he asked in challenge. Bilbo's gems were not as secret as the hobbit had thought- with their resonance and the dwarves’ stone sense, hiding them was completely futile. As soon as they had been able to get Balin alone, they’d pounced on him to find out what he carried that tickled their senses in so unusual a fashion. He hadn’t shown them the gem, that was far too private and they’d never ask, but he did give them the shaky explanation which Bilbo had provided. To a dwarf, they all concluded that it was a fabrication, but couldn’t figure out _why_. Was he hiding a hobbit secret? Was he hiding a Bilbo secret? Or was it something else which they couldn’t even begin to guess? They all decided to let the explanation remain, as it didn’t appear to cause any harm, and they had far more pressing matters to attend.

 

As each dwarf gained his gem, he shared what he could of Bilbo's explanation, and slowly their understanding broadened. It _was_ a hobbit secret which was being protected, though apparently to hobbits the gems were as common as lapis was to dwarves and worn as openly. And they all realized that Bilbo was breaking a rather deep taboo in gifting the gems to them. Each dwarf treasured his friendship with their hobbit even more after they learned of that tidbit. Curiously, Thorin had never joined in their group, and many wondered if he could even sense the gems, or if his sense of stone was about as keen as his sense of direction.

 

Ori bashfully scooted forward so that he could kneel down near one of the red gems and then carefully put out his hand so that he was almost touching it, but didn’t pick it up. His face pinched at whatever he sensed and he looked over to receive an encouraging nod from Nori. Ori visibly braced himself and then clamped the gem between his fingers.

 

Dwalin and Glóin both reached out to steady Dori as Ori collapsed in on himself with a gasping keen. He dropped the gem and fought to gain his feet, then staggered into Dori’s arms as tears ran from his wide eyes.

 

They all looked at each other in silent shock as Ori’s breathy sobs slowly wound down with the addition of Nori to the huddle. The three brothers remained standing for a few moments longer as their youngest recovered from whatever he’d experienced. Finally Ori turned to face them, eyes red and face so very pale.

 

“Those are Bilbo's, I’d stake my life on it, though I didn’t know he carried any others in that pouch of his. They’re like our blue ones, but somehow they’re pain- crushing, shattering, _ruining_ pain. They didn’t sing, Nori,” he turned haunted eyes to his brother and Nori flinched, “they _shrieked_. We need to pick these up and get them back to Bilbo- they’re part of his hobbit secret, and he’ll know what to do with them.”

 

They agreed that the stones and fragments needed to be collected, but ran into a problem. How does one pick up gems which they cannot touch? Bifur solved their problem quite handily- he tossed a scrap of leather at Balin and signed a long string complete with pantomimes.

 

“Ah, yes, thank you Bifur. That will be quite handy,” Balin praised, and used Bifur’s empty flower sack as an impromptu glove to sweep the gems and shards into a pile, and then Dwalin offered a bit of cloth from the bottom of his tunic so that Balin could sweep the pile into the sack. The dwarves checked the area thoroughly to make sure that they captured all the pieces- not only was it Bilbo's secret, but the gems were particularly shocking to dwarf senses if picked up unawares, and they didn’t want someone stumbling across a gem days or weeks later.

 

Balin tucked the little sack safely into his tunic, under layers and belt, so that it wouldn’t become lost, and resolved to sneak out later to find Bilbo. He had gems to return, and a friend to whom he owed the deepest apologies even if it sidestepped the _intent_ of Bilbo's banishment. Balin’s thoughts were echoed in eleven other minds, though none knew that their plans were to be interrupted in the worst possible way. Blaring horns drew them running to the front of the gate to witness Dáin’s army arrive into the armed teeth of the blockade.

 

_-*-_

 

Bilbo awoke with a start, heart pounding, and he mentally scrambled to recall where he was- his cot was far too large for him, he was sleeping with his head towards the door when he _never_ did that, and… wait… cot? Door? Bilbo frowned furiously as he forced the mental fog to recede only to feel a punch in the chest the memories hit. Oh. The Arkenstone, Thorin and the gate, and losing everyone that he’d come to care about. As he sat gathering himself, the din from outside finally filtered through his fugue and caused his heart to race anew- he knew those clashes and screams! Bilbo slipped his ring on and darted out of the tent, terrified that he’d find his plan failed and his dwarves locked in battle with men and elves. Instead, what he found was beyond nightmare.

 

Men, elves, and foreign dwarves fought goblins and mounted orcs. It looked as though the entire valley seethed and roiled as they came together, clashed, and spread apart again. Bilbo panted shallowly as he stood, transfixed by the horrific sight. Nothing had prepared him for _this_ , not even the fights they’d run into during their journey. And fights they had been, Bilbo realized, not battles. This was battle; this was _war_.

 

Bilbo eased his way around the periphery as best he could, though the shifting battlefield enveloped and then left him several times as its edges ebbed and flowed. He couldn’t stand not knowing where his dwarves were, his _friends_ , and so set out towards where he expected them to make their stand- the gates of Erebor. The foreign dwarves he assumed belonged to Dáin, for he’d heard Roäc warn Thorin that they were near, but he didn’t know they had arrived.

 

It was as he was skirting a large pile of goblin bodies, with his face carefully turned away so as to miss the gruesome sight, that Bilbo saw the most wondrous and heartening vision. “The eagles! The eagles are coming!” he yelled, forgetting in his delight that an invisible voice on the battlefield was never a good thing. He didn’t see the rock which smashed into his temple, but it very effectively sent him off of his feet and tumbling into the pile of bodies which he had been avoiding. Soon a stabbing pain in his calf joined the absolutely _blinding_ pain in his head, and Bilbo would have shrieked in pain if he could have, but nothing wanted to work right as he tumbled down the bodies to land in dirt made muddy by blood. Whatever stabbed his calf slipped free, and he did manage a moan which was no more than a tiny huff of breath as blackness stole in to claim him.

 

Waking was nowhere near pleasant as his head pounded and his eyes gummily stuck shut. Bilbo lifted a hand to swipe at his eyes, but instead painfully whacked his nose as his hand shook horribly and the entire arm didn’t seem to respond right. He fretted and squirmed until he lay on his back, and then tried again with only a little better success. The left eye, the one away from where he’d been hit, opened and Bilbo blinked blearily up into an orange-streaked sky. He puzzled over that until finally his scrambled mind provided that he was looking at a _sunrise_ … he’d been unconscious for the rest of the battle _and_ the night following!

 

Bilbo heard voices calling over the valley and waved his hand to attract attention. Nothing. Bilbo puzzled over why, until the answer hit him in a glint of gold- he was still wearing his ring! He frantically pulled it off of his sweaty hand and stuffed it in his pocket before trying to stand. His left leg seemed fine, only weak, but his right leg had gone completely numb and had as much strength as overcooked pasta. He yelped as he slid back down to the ground, and attracted the attention of a nearby man.

 

“Mercy be, you’re in sad shape, aren’t you?” the man asked as he scooped up an unprotesting hobbit. “And from your size, Mister, I think that you’re the one that they’ve been searching all night for!”

 

“Who?” Bilbo muzzily asked. His vision swam in and out of focus and the pressure of the man’s arm under his legs made his right calf _burn_. The other eye finally cracked open, gummed closed by dried blood which, when wetted by the eye’s tears, stung horribly and tinted Bilbo's vision red. Bilbo gave up and closed both eyes; it was easier to drift in the man’s arms.

 

The man shook his head. “Dunno, that wizard fella and some of them dwarves. Had a big uproar after the battle died down and no one could find you,” he explained.

 

Bilbo made a faint sound of interest, and then the roaring in his ears made it impossible for him to hear anything else. He caught a few stray words from the man as they jostled quickly back to the camp, not enough to make sense of anything, but enough to tell Bilbo that he’d lost consciousness more than once.

 

“Bilbo, there you are, I was…” Gandalf's voice boomed, then gentled down to nearly a whisper. Cool fingers ghosted across Bilbo's forehead and he found the strength to look up into Gandalf's worried face. “They wanted me to bring you to talk to him, but I don’t think you have enough time for that, my friend,” Gandalf sorrowfully stated without explanation. Bilbo drifted as the man carrying him was directed to Gandalf's own tent, and the frantic word which followed him into the hot swallowing darkness was _haste_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A note on lapis, or lapis lazuli to name it properly- it's a beautiful semi-precious gem in the most unreal shade of blue, marbled through with what looks like gold. It isn't, it's only pyrite, but it's still an extremely striking mix. Stone lore claims that lapis brings about harmony in relationships and is a stone of wisdom and awareness. A rather nice stone for dwarven friendships, I thought :)
> 
> There is now art for this chapter! My wonderful friend Sabrina has drawn Ori's brave reach for the red gem, with his shadow falling over the ground... <http://akblake1.tumblr.com/post/85105764064/sabrinas-super-wonderful-depiction-of-ori-about>


	13. Heliotrope

Balin sent a glare over his shoulder as he was shoved again. They had all been scattered in their search for Bilbo, until Nori dashed through with word that he’d located the hobbit in Gandalf's tent; at that all nine relatively ambulatory members of Thorin’s company had congregated outside of the tent. Balin, as second after Thorin, had quickly assumed leadership of the bunch, but that still didn’t keep his lump of a brother from nearly stepping on him in his eagerness to see their friend again.

 

As Balin threw open the tent’s fabric door, they were all shocked back a step at the wall of noise that smacked into them. The wizard had worked some sort of impressive craft to keep sounds from escaping to the outside, but inside it sounded as if he was torturing their poor hobbit friend. Balin and the dwarves charged forward to fill the tent’s stuffy interior as Gandalf looked up to glare.

 

“Out! Out, all of you, I haven’t the time to fool with nosy dwarves!” the wizard snapped even as he looked back to whatever he was doing to Bilbo's calf. Balin couldn’t clearly see exactly what was being done as cloths were in the way, but it elicited weak cries from their friend in protest.

 

Balin ignored the order as did every dwarf behind him. Gandalf huffed to himself in annoyance. “Very well, if you insist upon staying then at least make yourselves more useful than statues. Someone calm him – he’s taken a head wound and I cannot risk a sleeping tonic – and I shall need more fresh water in a moment along with more clean cloths.”

 

Dwarves jolted into motion. Dwalin and Bifur stepped back to bracket the tent’s door; they would only get in the way of the others, but they could appoint themselves as guardians of the tent. Ori, mindful of his bruised shoulder, moved to take the water bucket at Gandalf's feet- on his way to meet the others he’d passed where the men had set up barrels of water, drawn from the mountain’s river for the healers to access quickly, and even without Dori’s pointed look Ori knew that he could help.

 

Balin himself stole up to Bilbo's head where it tossed fretfully on the cot’s thin pillow. The hobbit was laid on his belly, so that Gandalf could treat whatever wound he’d taken, and all Balin could see of him was the back of his head, where a bandage tied. Not paying one bit of mind to dirty, sweaty hair, Balin gently stroked lank curls out of Bilbo's face and had to smile fondly to himself. “You know, lad, ‘tisn’t the first time that I’ve had to comfort an ailing young one,” he mused in a low voice as he made himself comfortable sitting on a clothes chest just to the side of the cot.

 

Bilbo's head turned towards the sound of his voice. Balin knew from the fever and glaze in the hobbit’s eyes that the action came more from a deeply-seated desire for comfort than from any actual recognition. He simply continued with his caress, brushing along the side of Bilbo's face, and kept his voice low and gentle. “No, you would not believe what I’ve had to nurse my brother through…” Balin’s words froze in his throat as Bilbo cried out anew at a particularly painful action of Gandalf's, and a tear leaked out of his eye to slide down his cheek in a wet trail only to turn into…

 

“By the maker!” Balin swore in horror as he stumbled to his feet and caught every single eye. Ori, startled, dropped the empty water bucket in his hands as he jumped and crashed into Nori. Still edgy from battle, hands went to hidden weapons until Gandalf's voice filtered through their tired minds as he called for them to stop. Dwalin and Bifur appeared as if they dearly wished to step away from their self-appointed posts to join the others, but duty to their friend held them fast at either side of the tent’s interior entrance.

 

As unwilling as they were to press Gandalf about Bilbo's wounds while he was concentrating so completely on healing them, Balin could simply not allow _this_ to pass without explanation. He pushed back the light sheet to discover where the little gem had slipped down to, only to discover a small pile of purple gems pressed between Bilbo's body and the cot. Balin forgot, in his shock, exactly what effect those gems had; he reached out to a dull little lilac gem which looked as if it had been soaked in undiluted etching acid, and then _violently_ shuddered as his body roared with pain as if he had been dropped directly into one of the giant forges.

 

Only strong hands at his shoulders kept Balin on his feet, and Dori’s fingers pried the gem loose to fall harmlessly to the dirt at their feet. “You’d best explain, wizard, before we have you removed and call for our own healers,” Dori threatened with his flat, but very rational voice. Bombur’s great bulk stirred angrily at the accusation and Glóin swelled as he flexed his arms in preparation for action.

 

Nori shifted closer to the shadows and took advantage of Gandalf's distraction to move around so that he could see exactly what the wizard was doing to their friend. “Poison,” slipped out, only the breath of a whisper, but it was enough to startle Gandalf back into motion despite being caught wrong-footed by the dwarves.

 

“Yes, Master Nori, poison,” he irritably replied to the easier question and tried to smack Nori’s hand away as the dwarf snuck in to finger a sample of the black ooze from Bilbo's leg. “Goblins don’t often coat their weapons with poison, as few have the patience to care, but the ones who do will use a mixture of every foul substance they can find.”

 

Dori didn’t watch Gandalf as the wizard spoke; instead, he watched his brother as Nori inspected the black which coated his fingertip. A simple taste had Nori looking back with wide eyes, and Dori felt his heart slam in his chest at the unguarded look of fear. “Glóin, they used yellow spores!” Nori shouted urgently, and Glóin ran out of the tent past a white-faced Bifur without a word. His steps were made uneven by broken toes on one foot, but they could all hear his boots heavily pounding in a flat out sprint.

 

“What are yellow spores?” Gandalf prompted as he exchanged the fouled cloth in his hand for fresh, and dipped it into herbed water before he turned back to cleaning the wound. Bilbo's whimpers drew Balin back to comfort him, despite the shocking sight of purple gems occasionally falling to the cot. Bombur looked terrified and sick where he stayed out of the way at the edge of the tent.

 

This time, Bofur spoke up, as he had far more cause than most to know the effects. “There’s a moss which grows in the lowest tunnels and caverns,” he shuffled up to join Balin and gently stroked a hand down Bilbo's spine between his shoulder blades. Their friend quieted a bit under their touch, and his restless movements ceased. “Normally the moss is right safe and sits there without bothering anybody, but if it’s disturbed it sends out a cloud of yellow spores which are pure death.” Bofur shuddered. “Breathe them in, and your lungs fill with blood; if they land on a wound, it gets into your blood and eats away at you from the inside. You only have a few hours to catch it quick, or else you’re left hoping that a healer or family member will… that they’ll be kind enough to…”

 

Gandalf's eyes fell closed in sadness as he did indeed understand what Bofur tried to say. An elf could send his own spirit on if suffering became too great, when the only relief to be found was when all life stopped, but dwarves and men were forced to rely on others for mercy. “I don’t believe that we shall need such measures,” he reassured, “for hobbits are remarkably resilient to most poisons from the natural world.” The wizard hesitated for a moment before he went on to admit, “Though they do not have defense against poisons of a fouler sort.”

 

Nori nodded, expression far too serious and knowing. “I may have something which can help with that,” he offered before he darted out of the tent. Ori and Dori shared a look before the younger also pelted out of the tent, empty bucket in hand for fresh water.

 

Silence uneasily fell within the tent as they waited for their missing dwarves to return, and was only broken by Bilbo's whimpers and delirious mumblings as Gandalf worked to clean out as much of the bloody ooze from the puncture as possible. It had begun to go sour far too easily during the time that Bilbo lay on the battlefield, a secondary effect of the poison which few lived to experience. The foul concoctions usually killed man, dwarf, and elf outright within a few hours, their bodies simply unable to fight whatever goblins used in their mixture, but if one happened to linger through the poison, wound rot rapidly set in. Goblins thrived in filth, and their rarely-used poisons reflected this. Even their untainted weapons carried danger, as goblin blades were never cleaned and a cut from one always required treatment or else risk a life-threatening rot to fester in the wound.

 

To be helpful, Bombur mastered his body’s response to the blood and ick and pushed around behind Gandalf to stand at his side and helped to hold Bilbo's squirming leg to the cot. One meaty hand wrapped nearly around the hobbit’s thigh, so great had their hobbit lost his comfortable padding of flesh during their journey, while the other joined with Bofur’s in gently patting Bilbo's back. This close, the sickly-sweet odor of a sour wound couldn’t be missed, even when covered by the sharp nose-biting scent of the poison. “You are missing four of your number,” Gandalf hesitantly broached, and watched as the dwarves looked among themselves for a moment.

 

“The lads ran out without mail or padding,” Dwalin finally admitted when none seemed to prefer speaking. “They didn’t lose anything valuable, but Óin’s being kept busy stitching their hides back together where the idiots took hits. Thank the maker that their hides are as thick as their heads!” Several others grumbled an agreement to Dwalin's sentiment.

 

Worry pulled Gandalf's eyebrows together as no word came of the final dwarf. “And what of Thorin? The healer was most frantic that Bilbo speak to him in the healing tent,” he questioned.

 

“Oh, he’ll be fine,” Bofur chimed in. “I was over there earlier, before all this, and heard the row he had with Thranduil’s healers in the Kings’ tent over the sleeping tonic they were forcing on him. Apparently he took a mace to the knee and it dented the bone a bit; he wanted to see Bilbo and apologize before the healers had their way.” He leaned in towards the other dwarves with eyes twinkling. “Personally, I think those elves are afraid of him- won’t try to heal his knee unless he’s asleep and can’t hit them!” Chuckles were shared around.

 

“Kings’ tent?” Gandalf questioned.

 

Bofur nodded. “Aye, heard that they have Thranduil stuffed in there with Thorin, and Bard too since they didn’t know where else to put him,” he laughed.

 

“That’s sure to end in tears!” someone hooted, but their merrymaking was interrupted as Ori quickly brought back the bucket of water and deposited it on the low table where Gandalf indicated, and then there was a bit of commotion when both Glóin and Nori tried to avoid running into each other at the doorway. They only ended up tripping over each other and slammed into Dori, who grunted as they jostled bruised ribs but stood as a firm buttress while they both regained their footing.

 

Since he was closer, Glóin limped to Gandalf first and handed the wizard a small pouch of chopped herbs. “Óin got this from one of the Iron Hills healers, but it’s the same as what we use for the spores. He needs to breathe in the smoke as they burn,” Glóin explained. As they didn’t have a brazier in the tent, or much of anything really, Gandalf simply made do with his own pipe. It was packed with the herbs instead of pipeweed, but Balin and Bofur worked together to coerce a very woozy Bilbo into smoking it. Familiar with the herb mix, as most dwarves were, they knew that it wasn’t harmful to those who weren’t poisoned so that healers could help without being overcome by the smoke. Even though it had to be repeated often, only a small amount of the herbs were required each time, and so the two were finished in short order.

 

Nori edged closer to show Gandalf a miniscule vial filled with an oily brown fluid. “I need to pour this into the wound, and you’d better hold him down- he’s not going to like it when I do,” he warned. Dwarves and wizard scrambled to get firm holds on the hobbit where they could hopefully keep him from thrashing, yet not hurt their friend. Nori removed the vial’s cork, hardened his heart, and grabbed the injured leg’s ankle before he upended the fluid into the swollen, red puncture. Bilbo _shrieked_.

 

They all had a nightmare of a time trying to hold down the writhing, screaming hobbit, as it turned out that hobbits were rather more agile than expected. Gandalf's hand slipped on Bilbo's good leg, slippery with sweat, and he caught a flying foot to the stomach. Nori winced in sympathy; he could feel the density of bone under his grip, and it seemed that hobbit foot bones were considerably thicker than they appeared, like iron, compared to others’. A solid kick from their friend would likely feel like a hit from a smith’s hammer.

 

Bilbo cried, twisted, squirmed, and fought, but his burst of energy faded quickly into fretful twitches and helpless tears. Nori stopped Gandalf's hands as he reached to wipe away the blood, black ooze, and streaks of brown oil which had seeped from the wound. “Don’t touch that, it’ll eat your skin like acid unless you’ve been poisoned,” he warned, and took the cloth from Gandalf. Nori efficiently cleaned and then bound the inflamed puncture so that no more of the oil would seep out. He then carefully folded the soiled cloth so that none of the oil was exposed, and dropped it onto the accumulated pile at the end of the cot.

 

“Nori, how did you…” Gandalf started to ask, but was cut off by Dwalin’s form pushing around him to go back to guarding the entrance.

 

Dwalin and Nori shared a look as he passed, and Nori sighed in resignation. “I know poisons because I’m Thorin’s Shadow,” he admitted as if it explained everything, and to those who understood dwarves, it did. Gandalf's eyebrows climbed in surprise- Nori was effectively Thorin’s hidden guard (and his hidden assassin, when all else failed) who did his duties tucked away in the shadows while Dwalin guarded him in the light, in plain sight. It was usually a pair which only a King had, and Thorin was still a Prince as there could be no coronation outside of the mountain, but others had sensed the opportunity to kill the heir while he was relatively defenseless and exposed. Dwalin defended against the overt threats while Nori defended against those who would strike from hidden places with poisons, a knife in the back, or others paid to do the dirty work for them. Sometimes it was enough to stop the threats, but sometimes Nori was sent out to permanently stop someone, and there he truly earned his knowledge of poisons. Sleight of hand and a thief’s quickness were assets when getting close enough to ensure that the deed was done.

 

Balin cleared his throat to break the atmosphere, and made an obvious change in topic. He pointed at the purple gems, their dull outsides seeming so very innocent, scattered around by Bilbo's thrashing. “Your explanation of this has been delayed long enough, Gandalf, and normally I’d not call a wizard to account for his doings, but this involves one who we’ve claimed as friend. We’ll need a good reason for what you’ve done to him, or we’ll be forced to call for Dáin’s soldiers to escort you out of Erebor’s lands.”

 

An absolutely gobsmacked expression met Balin’s words. “What I’ve?” Gandalf asked faintly in shock as his obviously exhausted mind struggled with the accusation. “Master Dwarf, I’ve done absolutely nothing to Bilbo other than help him when I thought that no other healer could, and use my own ways to hold back the poison’s spread!” Gandalf chided sharply as he marshalled his mental faculties. He sighed and continued on with a much kinder tone. “Bilbo's tears are perfectly natural for a hobbit! It is an ability which they are very careful to keep hidden from outsiders, though I suppose that I am responsible for the ones which you see as I did cause pain while tending to him.”

 

Balin used the sleeve of his tunic to safely brush aside some of the gems cried from their treatment of the poison so that he could stroke Bilbo's fever-warmed face. Their hobbit had finally fallen asleep after Nori’s treatment, worn out from the lingering traces of his head wound, the poison’s effects, and the pain he’d withstood for hours, not to mention his struggles against them. Even asleep, lines of discomfort pulled at the corners of his eyes and around his lips as his body fought against what traces remained. “Forgive me for my suspicions, Gandalf, for I’ve seen _these_ gems before even if I never knew how they were made,” he admitted.

 

Eyes turned towards the old dwarf in surprise, and even Gandalf's eyes widened in surprise. Balin chuckled. “Not all of you may remember, but our mother sat on Thrór’s council as an advisor over the markets. One of the men from Dale gifted her with a brooch, likely in an attempt to curry favor, which was set with purple gems the likes of which not even we had seen. She could barely stand to look at the thing as the gems set her senses to shivering and crying out, and she disposed of it at the first opportunity.” Balin motioned to the gems which were brushed aside near Bilbo's hand where it loosely curled up under the hobbit’s chin. “They were of a very similar feel to these, though nowhere near as strong, and have identical coloring.”

 

Gandalf sighed with resignation. “It is likely that those gems also came from hobbits, though I can certainly state that they were not given freely. Perhaps Bilbo won’t mind if I share a little about hobbit history to help you better understand his reluctance to speak freely, even if I feel that your company may be trusted in this matter.” He made himself comfortable on the ground as there were no seats within his tent and exhaustion pulled at even his endurance. The dwarves followed his example and, as best they could, arranged themselves so that they could see both the wizard and their friend on the cot.

 

“Quite a while back, long before the hobbits settled into their current home, hobbits did not hold their ability as secret. When great emotion moves them to tears, any emotion at all be it happiness, pain, love, or anguish, their tears crystallize into brilliantly colored gems. They freely gave their gems where they would- even to dwarves and elves, with whom they had the most contact, and then to men as they first encountered them far in the east. It wasn’t until men learned of their ability that hobbits learned how to fear.” Gandalf's voice turned dark and the dwarves couldn’t help but shiver.

 

“Men who lived in darkness saw the gems and let greed rule their hearts: they captured traveling hobbits and experimented until they learned that torture, pain, could produce tears for them. The jewelry made from those tears commanded high prices as the gems used were unique among all others, though most who purchased them were unaware of their source. After that, bands of brigands raided the outlying villages until many stood empty and entire family lines were gone- tortured for their gems, and then slain when their ability broke under the harsh treatment and they could produce no more tears.”

 

Ori sniffled and leaned heavily into Dori who appeared nearly apoplectic, even as he comforted his brother, while many others surreptitiously blinked away tears of their own. Dwarves had their own sad and violent histories, but they were built to endure hardship, built for battle. Hobbits, like their own Bilbo Baggins, were built for gentle things and peace, not pain and suffering and the thought of harming such a people horrified each one of them.

 

“Is this why he didn’t want to tell us about it?” Bifur finally cleared his throat enough to ask. Not many understood his words, but Gandalf understood him perfectly.

 

“In a way, that is why he didn’t wish to tell you about them,” Gandalf agreed, face saddened as he looked towards Bilbo. “The hobbits eventually moved west, where they currently live, to escape the hunting and decided to turn away from the outside world. No longer would a hobbit travel among elves, dwarves, or men, far from the safety of their hidden villages. Knowledge of their ability was named as a secret, to be kept only by hobbits, and forbidden to others. Bilbo is… he is being pulled,” Gandalf tried to explain. “As grandson to their Thain, the closest hobbits have to a ruler, Bilbo was taught a more thorough version of their history than most of his people learn from their families. He has taken the threat very much to heart and it’s been pulling at him even as his friendship with you has pulled at him to tell you what his gems mean as he’s given them to you.”

 

Ori looked downright confused as his shy voice piped up. “But we’re not _men_ , why couldn’t he have told us about them?”

 

“Because we’re _dwarves_ ,” Nori immediately answered, with a dark look of understanding on his face, “and everybody knows that dwarves horde precious gemstones.”

 

“Now see here, his gems are nowhere near the same!” Glóin blustered angrily as his beard bristled with anger. Shouts of angry argument and rebuttal, mostly from Dwalin whose voice roared above the others, rose until Balin caught their attention.

 

“Nori and Glóin are both correct, but did any of us sit Bilbo down to _explain_ this to him? No, instead we kept our secrets just as he kept his. The fault is just as much ours,” the old dwarf rubbed his face tiredly and winced as he pressed over bruises. “When he wakes, I’ll take responsibility and talk to the lad. With Thorin, Fíli, and Kíli all in the healing tents, I believe that I’m the one left who can break our secrecy.”

 

Bombur shifted uncomfortably on the hard ground. “Mister Gandalf, can you tell us what the colors mean?” he asked, uncomfortable with the wizard’s scrutiny. “We all have a blue gem which feels absolutely lovely to hold, and then we found some red ones which they said felt horrible, and now these purple ones… what do they all mean?”

 

Gandalf appeared alarmed at the mention of red gems. “Where did you find the red ones?”

 

The little bag was tugged from its safe place under Balin’s belt and held up. “We found these near where he’d been standing on top of the gate that day,” Balin explained. He abruptly lost possession of the bag when it was snatched from his hands faster than his eyes could follow the motion. Outraged shouts rang out from the company as Gandalf hid the gems inside of his flowing robes and Balin briefly entertained the foolish notion of reclaiming them by force. Instead, he raised his hand to quiet the raised voices and looked back down at their sleeping friend to assure himself that they hadn’t awakened him with their volume. Bilbo slept on, oblivious.

 

“You truly should not have those, Master Dwarf, as a hobbit would _never_ consider keeping them,” Gandalf scolded Balin, who did not seem terribly impressed. “Anguish of the heart causes tears which form red gems, and those should be ground up into dust for the wind to carry away. The purple gems you see were created by pain of the body, and those should be thrown into the river at our first opportunity. Your blue gems, however, were meant to be kept as the treasures they are, for they were made from tears of happiness.”

 

Every dwarf smiled as he sought the resonance from his own blue gem and what they now knew as the echo of Bilbo's happiness. It was that echo which made them stand out among regular gemstones and reached out even when the gems were cleverly hidden away. “And what of the way that they _feel_ \- have you an answer for that?” Glóin blustered in with his usual tact.

 

Appearing truly baffled, Gandalf took a few moments before he answered. “I do not know, but I can only speculate that your sense of the gems is unique to dwarves. As long as I’ve known them, hobbits have never made mention of such a phenomenon, and I’ve never experienced it myself as I’ve handled them.”

 

Further discussion was interrupted by the rowdy entrance of a loudly complaining Óin. Everyone startled and jumped to their feet, which was well as the reason for Óin’s displeasure came limping through the tent’s door with the aid of Kíli’s shoulder and would have tripped over seated dwarves.

 

Thorin, bruised and unable to bear weight on his right knee, shuffled determinedly into Gandalf's tent and stood in defiance of Óin’s tutting. He leaned heavily on a bandaged Kíli’s shoulders and swayed drunkenly, but stood upright and moved, for the most part, with more determination than true coordination.

 

Fíli scattered everyone further as he and a dwarf wearing the armor of Dáin’s army entered with a small cot held between them. Amid questions, they settled the cot near Bilbo's and then the dwarf beat a hasty retreat to leave Fíli standing alone.

 

“Oh, enough shouting!” Kíli shouted above the questions, and Fíli snickered at his brother as Thorin flinched at the noise and nearly took them both to the ground. Kíli directed his uncle to the cot and unceremoniously dropped him to sit on it. Óin took the opportunity to pounce on his dazed patient and berate him loudly.

 

Gandalf was crowded back against his tent’s fabric by the press of solid dwarf bodies and the noise level rose to a truly raucous din as everyone tried to have his question heard over everyone else’s. “Silence!” he boomed, and sent dwarves scurrying. He finally had enough space to breathe in, and silence enough to hear Bilbo's shivers as the fever set in.

 

He took in a bracing breath. “I’ll need a blanket for Bilbo,” he started. Dwalin and Bifur, the closest to the tent’s door, nodded and stepped out to procure the item. “And now I’d like to know why our esteemed Thorin Oakenshield has forsaken the Kings’ tent to crowd _ours_.” Gandalf's face may have been inquisitive, but his voice was a firm order to explain.

 

“’M not leaving,” Thorin slurred from his cot as he cracked open glazed eyes to glare blurrily at Gandalf. He irritably twitched his knee away from Óin’s grasp as the healer tried to rearrange one of the disheveled dressings on it but didn’t bother to reopen eyes which had slipped closed again.

 

Fíli took pity on his uncle and spoke up from where he and Kíli were sitting slumped together on the ground by his cot. “He’s got it in his head that he has to be here to say his farewell if Bilbo should die, or to apologize when Bilbo wakes,” he tiredly explained with a lackadaisical wave of his hand. “I don’t think he’s really all that awake- that tonic Thranduil’s healer gave him should’ve had him out for the rest of the night.”

 

There was a round of head shaking and smothered laughter as Dwalin and Bifur returned with a thick blanket for Bilbo. As it was tucked around their hobbit, it caught Óin’s attention and he turned his fussing to the other cot.

 

“Well now, what has he done to himself?” the dwarf demanded of Gandalf as he fussily checked the dressings on Bilbo's head and calf, and felt the heat radiating off the hobbit’s skin. Bilbo didn’t so much as twitch at the pair of hands touching his body.

 

Gandalf hid his amusement at Óin’s fussing. “He was struck in the head by something, though it damaged the skin only, and was poisoned by a goblin blade. Nori and Glóin helped to treat the wound, and it’s simply up to Bilbo and time to see how he fares,” he explained. Óin harrumphed but couldn’t find fault with what had already been done even as he twitched the blanket to lie just so on the cot without wrinkles.

 

“Now, I do not mind Thorin remaining here for the meantime, but I must urge the rest of you to find your own cots for the night and rest. The day has been long and we all must rest.” Gandalf shooed the dwarves out of his tent. Only Óin and Balin remained inside, though Dwalin and Glóin took up flanking positions outside of the tent’s entrance. They would leave, but they wouldn’t go far from the ones who they protected.

 

Despite the battle being the day before, weariness still dragged at most of them, especially as most carried wounds, and the dwarves were glad enough to scatter to their own bedding. Fíli and Kíli made it as far as Kíli’s cot, where they both curled up together in a pile of blankets and bandages.

 

Bombur, Bofur, and Bifur dragged themselves back to the tent that they shared and collapsed onto their own cots with heartfelt groans as bruises twinged and sore muscles complained. Bombur didn’t even bother with a blanket and simply slept where he lay. Bofur and Bifur shared a laugh at his antics before they, too, were asleep.

 

Dori and Nori shepherded a yawning Ori back to their tent where they helped their youngest brother shed enough layers to sleep comfortably and then warmly wrapped him up in his blanket. Dori surprised his younger brother with a hug, and Nori stiffened for a moment before he returned the embrace.

 

“Thank you for saving him,” Dori whispered so that he didn’t disturb Ori’s sleep.

 

Nori waved off the thanks, but couldn’t wipe the sheepish smile off of his face. “He’s my friend too, and if Thorin doesn’t ruin this, I’ll soon be Bilbo's Shadow as well,” he told his brother. Dori simply gave his brother a look and gently shoved him towards his own cot rather than reply. If Nori didn’t wish for any recognition for saving his friend’s life, the hobbit who was friend to them all and one who Dori already counted as another baby brother, then Dori wouldn’t force him into it. Instead, he’d do as he always did and look after his beloved middle brother, whether his brother appreciated it or not.


	14. Indigo

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My best (and incredibly patient) friend and Sabrina made a beautiful bit of art for chapter 12- it's Ori's shadow as he's reaching down to pick up that red gem... just before he finds out how badly hurt Bilbo was by Thorin's actions! Here's the link, but I also put it at the bottom of the chapter itself: [Here it is](http://akblake1.tumblr.com/post/85105764064/sabrinas-super-wonderful-depiction-of-ori-about)

Thorin grit his teeth and did his best to ignore the pounding agony in his knee as he shifted on the narrow cot. It was his second day in the wizard’s tent, his first day actually spent fully awake, and he wasn’t going to allow even his own body to distract him from his intended goal. Thorin’s eyes reopened and he focused unerringly on the cot directly to his left- Bilbo's. According to Óin, the hobbit hadn’t awoken once since Gandalf had Bilbo brought to his own tent for healing, and Thorin’s chest ached with guilty worry. At least his fever broke that morning, or so Thorin had been told when he woke up in time for lunch.

 

He wasn’t quite sure whether to be grateful to Óin for being so heavy-handed with the dwarven tonic, or a bit upset that he’d slept for nearly a day and a half. From the way that his knee shifted in the wrong places even though it was wrapped tightly, Thorin deeply suspected that muscle and tendon had been nearly separated from bone and that the bones themselves could have been damaged by Bolg’s mace. He may not have many of his kin’s gifts with stone, but intelligence itself told him that being awake earlier would _not_ have felt wonderful.

 

Despite it all, apparently he’d fought through most of the elven tonic to find his way to Bilbo's side. Once he learned that Thorin didn’t remember changing tents, or his consuming fixation with speaking to the hobbit, Óin had taken great pleasure in telling Thorin exactly how idiotic he’d been for moving so soon as he served Thorin some kind of… mush for lunch. Truthfully, Thorin couldn’t begin to guess at what it could have been- the teas and tonics that Óin had made him drink before he’d been allowed to eat had coated his tongue with their foul taste and he ate simply to avoid a second round of the healer’s scowling inspection.

 

Thorin’s inspection of Bilbo's unmoving form was disturbed by Balin’s entrance into the tent. “How is the lad?” Balin gently asked as he made himself comfortable between the cots. A small crate had been brought in and upended in place of a chair as, according to Dwalin who faithfully guarded their tent’s door, the two never lacked visitors.

 

“Óin says that his fever broke this morning, and has guessed that he will awaken either today or tomorrow,” Thorin quietly answered. Even though they didn’t truly need to quiet their voices for Bilbo's sake, as their friend wasn’t actually sleeping as one would sleep at night and loud sounds wouldn’t disturb him, neither could bring themselves to speak much above a murmur.

 

Balin patted Thorin’s forearm. “We all hope for the best,” he vowed.

 

They shared a silence as they both watched their hobbit sleep. He’d been cleaned of grime not long after dawn on the second day, Thorin had been told, and Dori had taken special care to wash all the dried blood and mud out of the curly hair. There’d been a mention of some special trip to the River Running, but Thorin hadn’t really understood and others had crowded forward with their own tales, so he’d shoved his confusion away. But at least the little one breathed easily and peacefully in his sleep and his face was the normal pink that Thorin was used to seeing on him. Even the cut on his temple, where he’d been hit with a rock, was healing over well as it had been left uncovered to breathe and scab over. Thorin hadn’t seen the other wound yet, but Nori had been by not long ago and explained about the deep puncture, and the poisoning. He’d gone very weak when his Shadow told him exactly how close the poison came to claiming Bilbo's life. Without the wizard holding it back and without his own dwarves helping, their hobbit would have burned as fever and agony ate him from the inside out; granting the swift death of mercy would have been a blade in Thorin’s heart as well, but had the worst happened he would have ordered it done to spare their hobbit a slow and torturous end.

 

“Dáin wishes for your approval on how much gold he’s already sent out from the treasury, and I need you to look over the preliminary agreement that he’s made with the men,” Balin finally broke the silence and laid out a sheaf of papers on Thorin’s lap.

 

Thorin quickly paged through the accounting sheets. “Glóin has already given his own approval?” he asked distractedly and received an affirmative from the old dwarf. “He knows how we planned to distribute the metals, so I won’t stand over his work.”

 

He looked up to catch Balin’s knowing gaze. His old mentor wouldn’t call him on avoiding gold at the moment, not after his disgraceful actions before. “Aye, Glóin’s keeping to the decisions the two of you agreed to in Lake-Town, and the men have taken far less than they originally requested. I’m not sure of their reasoning, but for now _our_ expenditures are mostly silver pieces for the import of food and healing supplies from small farms within a day’s ride.”

 

“We cannot depend on those for long,” Thorin frowned as he knew that the small family farms only kept small provisions on hand. “Can Dáin send for more supplies from the Iron Hills?”

 

“He’s already sent a crow and anticipates that it will be at least three days before they arrive, if they ride hard and have favorable weather.”

 

“Then we will have to make the most with what we have and ask the uninjured if they would be willing to cut their rations until fresh supplies arrive.” Balin nodded and Thorin turned his attention back to the papers in his hands. “Dáin is housing men in Erebor?” he asked in pure surprise.

 

At that, Balin shifted uneasily. “Smaug’s wrath devastated Lake-Town, very little of it remains above the water. Bard has announced that he wishes to rebuild Dale for them, but until then the men need somewhere safe to keep their families and injured. Mirkwood is hardly safe, with the spiders roaming free, and so Dáin… did the only thing that he could. He offered them shelter in Erebor until homes can be rebuilt in Dale.”

 

“But in _Erebor_? Has my cousin no sense?” Thorin pounded his fist down without thinking and then had to bite back a howl as it jarred his angrily throbbing knee. The pain took his breath away and knocked into his head that Óin had been truthful when he described just how close Thorin had come to having his leg torn off. Once the pain receded enough to where he could breathe again, Thorin pushed back Balin’s hands and picked up the scattered papers. “Has Dáin not considered that our home isn’t even safe for dwarves right now, much less men who can’t sense stone? What will he do if a child wanders off and falls? That beast stripped even the barrier rails off the paths and bridges for their gold!”

 

Sometime during his tirade and ensuing bout of pain, Óin had ducked back into the tent and now stood glaring at him. Thorin glared heatedly back. “No, I do not want another sleeping tonic!” he preemptively barked, temper well and truly frayed. Óin gave him an unimpressed look and turned to the small table that had been dragged in while Balin touched his arm to redirect his attention.

 

“Dáin hasn’t allowed them to roam unchecked through the halls,” he assured in a gentle voice. “He’s asked that they remain in the old market and surrounding apartments, which were mostly spared the dragon’s rampage, and which still have their own functioning water access inside the mountain. His own assayers examined every single hand span of rock before he allowed the families inside, and he’s kept them away from the unprotected paths and bridges. He’s done his duty by you, both as regent and, more importantly, as your cousin.”

 

Thorin grunted his apathy at that point. “Then my cousin may not be as much of an idiot as I’d imagined. How will they survive without heat, though? The great forges we left burning should have run out of whatever wood remained inside them, and the dragon’s denuded our hillsides. We never had ground air to burn like our kin did in Ered Mithrin,” he couldn’t help but worry. Óin returned and shoved a wooden mug of tea under his nose.

 

“Not a tonic,” Óin explained at Thorin’s glare, “but it’ll dull the pain in your knee unless you manage to hurt yourself again.”

 

Thorin grudgingly accepted the mug and quickly swallowed the bitter concoction despite its heat. Even scalded, his tongue still managed to taste the stuff, and he had to work not to gag it back up. Óin recaptured the mug before it was dropped in disgust and stepped over to check on his other patient. Thorin ignored the papers in his hands, Balin, and even his own body’s responses in favor of watching Óin as he checked the hobbit’s temperature, heartbeat, and breathing. So intent, he only remembered to breathe in when Balin unobtrusively shoved a sharp elbow into his shoulder and the surprise made him gulp air into burning lungs.

 

“He’s still sleeping, but fine,” Óin declared when he finished his inspection of Bilbo. The two older dwarves traded an inscrutable look as Óin nodded and left the tent.

 

The papers lay abandoned on Thorin’s lap as he steadfastly watched Bilbo for a moment longer. Mind made up, he nodded to himself and turned to Balin. “Are the royal apartments safe enough to enter?”

 

Balin paused as he thought over every area for which Dáin’s assayers had given him reports. “I believe that they are, once the granite siege slabs were lifted, though only the hallways were inspected. Your rooms were left untouched out of respect,” he replied, curiosity bringing his eyebrows higher.

 

“In my bedroom, in the back corner by the desk, there is a safe set into the floor. Father had one put in all of our rooms when Grandfather went mad, so that we could hide our personal valuables from him,” Thorin frowned at the memory before he shook his head to forcibly dispel the mood. “The morning that Smaug came, I dressed for court in a rush and forgot to put my key back on after my bath; it should still be on the sink, just a small steel key on a necklace. Would you please open my safe and bring to me the redwood box from inside?”

 

With a curious glint in his eyes, Balin agreed and left Thorin to watch Bilbo in peace. Thorin stared until he realized how intent his focus had turned, then he shook his head and forced his eyes to the pages he’d been ignoring. Even as his eyes picked over the words and figures detailed on the low-quality yellow paper, likely scavenged from Lake-Town’s ravaged stores, his ears still remained sharply tuned to every breath that the hobbit took and the slight hitch in breath, a bit of a longer hold between inhale and exhale, brought Thorin’s attention around in time to see the small flickers of movement.

 

A furrow appeared between Bilbo's eyebrows for just a moment before it smoothed again. His hand which they left curled under his chin, and by which Óin used to check the strength of his heart’s beat by the vein in the wrist, made to tighten into a fist before relaxing again into the laxity of sleep. As it did, ragged fingernails scraped slightly over the sheet he lay on and made a faint whisper of sound, and that more than anything convinced Thorin that he hadn’t imagined the movement.

 

“Óin! Gandalf!” Thorin roared towards the tent door as he kept his eyes glued to Bilbo's still form.

 

Thumps and chaos sounded outside as he startled whoever had been sitting around, but Thorin couldn’t spare the effort to care. His heart thumped as he intently studied Bilbo's features for more movement. The hobbit, though, remained stubbornly still even after his bellow and the crashes from outside as it sounded like someone may have upset a cooking pot or three. Óin dashed in, out of breath and shoved an eager Kíli’s head back out of the tent as the younger dwarf made to follow in on his heels.

 

“Out, out, all of you- I’ll not trip over a pack of idiots!” he commanded as he shooed the curious onlookers back out. “Now, lad, why…” Óin turned to chastise Thorin only to be redirected.

 

Thorin quickly pointed to Bilbo. “He moved.” The two words were enough to silence the gruff dwarf as Thorin was temporarily ignored while Óin went about poking and prodding Bilbo. Unlike the last time he checked the hobbit, this time Bilbo flinched just the slightest when Óin gently handled his wounded calf. Óin’s grizzled face spread into the widest grin that Thorin had ever seen him wear.

 

“He’s waking up, lad,” he breathed, and turned to share the joyful look with Thorin. “Before, he was sleeping so deeply that we could clean that puncture and he didn’t react at all, but now he’s aware enough to feel pain. It’s a good sign,” Óin reassured as Thorin’s happiness faded into worry. “He’ll not be terribly happy once he wakes, but we’ll help him as best we can, and it’s better for him to wake now.”

 

Thorin frowned as Óin hedged around something. “Why is it better for him to wake now?”

 

“Gandalf…” Óin started and shifted uncomfortably as Thorin pinned him with a glare. “Gandalf explained that with the poison, the knock his head took, and the amount of blood that he lost, if he didn’t wake up after a couple of days, he likely wouldn’t wake at all,” he admitted.

 

Blinking seemed to be the only reaction that Thorin could give as he scrambled to understand. Dwarves were built by their creator to be sturdy beings, incredibly strong and as hard-wearing as the rock they so loved. Illness rarely bothered his people, beyond a cough which miners occasionally developed if the tunnels didn’t have clear air. Yellow spores would kill a dwarf, would drive the sufferer to beg for the mercy of a clean death long before the tortured body inevitably gave out. Injury would kill a dwarf, if significant enough. Warhammers could cave in even a dwarven skull or crush stout bones; swords and axes could pierce or cleave limbs from bodies; arrows could pierce unprotected organs… but dwarves either lived through the severe injuries, or they perished within a short time. They did not linger, they did not sleep without waking, and… were not as _fragile_ as the little hobbit laying just to his left. Thorin’s chest felt tight at the thought of never being able to apologize to the small being who had become so important to him and firmed his resolve to speak with Bilbo at the earliest opportunity.

 

A weathered hand on his forearm brought Thorin’s attention back to Óin. “He’s waking up,” the healer stressed slowly. “His head didn’t crack under the hit, only split the skin a bit, and he fought through the fever. He’s a strong hobbit, our Bilbo Baggins is, and he’ll not be giving up so easily so don’t you dare fret.” Thorin relaxed as Óin’s chiding, as familiar to him as his own voice, worked to reassure him better than any platitude could have.

 

“I’ve heard stories of men being… _changed_ by a hit to the head.” Thorin stated thickly and couldn’t bring himself to ask.

 

Óin appeared puzzled until he finally gave a small smile. “No lad, he wasn’t hit that hard. I checked myself before I allowed Gandalf to bandage him and the bone wasn’t damaged, only the skin, and his eyes didn’t change any. It looked like whatever hit him glanced off instead of striking true. Didn’t even need the edges sewn,” he turned a bit to gently ruffle Bilbo's hair even as he glanced again at the pink, scabbed cut.

 

As Thorin calmed, he had to agree that the cut wasn’t terribly large, nor did it look all that threatening, but the _stories_ that he’d heard had been enough to horrify. They were both startled when the hand that had been under Bilbo's chin flailed up to weakly bat at Óin’s hand where it still rested on the hobbit’s head.

 

Knees popping in protest, Óin crouched to put his face down near Bilbo's on the cot. “Bilbo, lad? Will you wake for us?” he gently crooned as he stroked the hobbit’s head to encourage another reaction, and Thorin’s eyebrows flew up. He’d never before heard _that_ tone out of the dwarf!

 

Commotion at the tent’s door heralded Gandalf's entrance, and heads popped in curiously before Thorin irritably scowled and signed for them to leave. If the healers were distracted by nosy dwarves, then they weren’t focusing on Bilbo, and Thorin wouldn’t allow that to happen. The others could gather their news at a later time, once Bilbo had been properly seen to.

 

The blanket and sheet covering their hobbit was swept back by Gandalf, and he murmured as he brought his hands along Bilbo's body. A hushed conversation with Óin escaped even Thorin’s sharp ears though both the dwarf and wizard nodded to each other as they spoke. Gandalf turned to the small table to mix water and herbs into one of the many bowls waiting, and as Óin moved aside, Thorin could see that Bilbo's face now carried a pinched look as he rose towards wakefulness and pain.

 

A faint whimper and twitch made Thorin try to reach out, even though he knew that they were too far apart, and his arm fell well short of the other cot. Óin caught the movement and, after a quick look at Gandalf's turned back, hooked the edge of Bilbo's cot and dragged it closer through the now hard-packed dirt of the tent’s floor before he joined Gandalf at the table. Thorin could now reach out his left arm and, if he stretched a bit, cup the crown of Bilbo's head with the palm of his hand. He awkwardly twisted his wrist and elbow around so that he could gently smooth at the wrinkles on Bilbo's forehead with his thumb before he gave in to temptation and stroked through the soft curls.

 

Fever sweat from that night and morning had dirtied Dori’s efforts at cleaning his hair, but Thorin didn’t care one bit. The skin under his fingers was warm with life, and that was more than he’d dared to hope for- he didn’t dare admit it to Óin, but the tonic he’d been given had allowed dreams to enter his sleep, but they were dreams without the grace of waking; nightmares. He saw Bilbo die in so many ways. By his own hand, thrown from the mountainside as his hobbit clung to his hand and begged for safety; curled in a burned agony from the dragon’s wrath as Thorin stumbled upon his lifeless body among those of his kin in the corridors of Erebor; held up and eviscerated by Azog while Thorin watched in frozen horror, agonized shrieks deafening his ears; over and over Thorin saw his worst fears play out in his nightmares and couldn’t wake from them. When the tonic finally released him from its grasp, all he could ask for was Bilbo, and the hobbit was all his eyes could turn to.

 

Those eyes now watched as Bilbo whimpered again, face crumpling, and the hobbit reached down to dig at his middle. “Óin?” Thorin called attention to the action and the dwarf hurried over with Gandalf on his heels.

 

“He was so cold that we left his little waistcoat on, but could it be pinching him?” Óin asked the wizard as the two worked to gently roll Bilbo onto his side to see if they could discover the source of his discomfort. The hobbit wasn’t trying to reach for his leg, he was definitely grasping around his waist until… until little fingers dipped into his waistcoat pocket and nudged a plain gold ring out to tumble onto the cot, and then onto the dirt. Bilbo whined as it fell from his grasp and went limp in their grasp.

 

Gandalf didn’t notice Óin settle Bilbo back onto his belly, however, as his attention was riveted upon the little snippet of gold as if it was a viper poised to strike. “No, do not touch it!” he exploded as Óin reached to pick up the simple thing, and warily stepped around it to fetch an empty bowl from the table’s edge. The wizard quickly upended the bowl over the ring and let out a deep sigh of relief. “I have not felt darkness like that for an age, and an artifact containing that much malice has no business attaching itself to a hobbit,” he explained to the shocked dwarves. “I must… consult another opinion. Do not disturb that bowl, and I shall return with all haste.” Gandalf gave the concealed ring a dark look and rushed out of the tent in a flurry of grey robes.

 

Thorin and Óin shared a puzzled look between them. “Nori!” Thorin called just loud enough to be heard outside, and his Shadow stepped inside moments later. “Follow Gandalf- I want to know who he sees and what they discuss,” Thorin ordered and Nori nodded sharply before he soundlessly darted back out of the tent. Thorin’s hand found its way back onto Bilbo's head, stroking through the strands, and the hobbit hummed lightly.

 

“Bilbo?” Thorin called at the new sound, and was rewarded with a louder hum. An uncoordinated little hand came up to capture his and bring it down to tuck under his face. Thorin’s face quirked oddly as his hand was used as an awkward pillow and warm breaths ghosted along the back of it from where Bilbo's nose pressed in near his wrist. He looked to Óin and blinked to find the old dwarf looking everywhere but at the two of them, lips pressed tightly together as if to hold back a grin. “He has quite the grip,” Thorin winced as Bilbo tightened his grasp on Thorin’s thumb joint and accidentally pressed pointy fingertips into the cluster of nerves there. Óin’s shoulders shook with what looked suspiciously like suppressed laughter as he quickly turned away to the table.

 

Jostling his hand a little, Thorin tried to waken Bilbo that way, or at least free his hand, but it only made the hobbit dig in deeper. He gave in with as much grace as he could and resigned himself to the indignity of leaning over his cot, serving as a hobbit pillow. At least Bilbo wasn’t frowning or whimpering anymore, Thorin congratulated himself. Moments later he nearly jumped out of his cot, and started a new hot throbbing in his knee for it, as Nori soundlessly appeared at his right shoulder.

 

Óin glared over as Thorin hissed and gripped his thigh above the knee with his right hand. “Now look what you’ve caused, barging in,” Óin growled at the younger dwarf. Nori had the grace to look abashed as Óin separated Thorin and Bilbo so that he could uncurl Thorin and unwind the dressings on his knee to apply a new poultice and dressing. Thorin didn’t chance looking to see just how bad the damage was- his stomach was already rolling from the pain, and he didn’t want to disgrace himself by being sick. Before he’d jumped, the tea had made it fade back to where he could mostly ignore it; the sudden resurgence left him shaken and ill.

 

Thorin gladly accepted whatever was in the mug that Óin handed him and didn’t bother to grimace at the foul taste. Whatever was in the poultice cooled the fire in his knee and took the worst of the bite out of the agony, to where he didn’t feel as if he had to gasp for breath. He still wasn’t entirely composed as he turned to Nori, but his Shadow had seen him in far worse condition and Thorin had quit worrying over his appearance before the dwarf decades ago. “What did you find?” he rasped, voice tight with pain and rough from Óin’s concoction.

 

“He met up with that dirty wizard, the one he called Radagast, and they spoke in one of the old elf languages. I couldn’t tell most of it, but I kept hearing the word for ring and something to do with a one, though I don’t think that either of them are planning to marry in the way of men.” Nori looked incredibly puzzled as he obviously worked the words around in his head. He shook his head as he gave up; they just didn’t make sense without knowing what all the rest of the words meant, he knew most dwarf terms and numbers in far more languages than his brothers would suspect, but ancient elf was far beyond even his immense skills.

 

Before Thorin could dismiss him, Gandalf plowed into the tent with Radagast fast on his heels. Thorin felt Nori slide away from him, into the corner’s shadows, and go still in the hopes of passing unnoticed by the two wizards. Gandalf spared no look but for the wooden bowl on the ground. He lifted it and used a small knife from the table to scoot the ring into the bowl before he handed it to Radagast.

 

“Well, what do you sense about it?” he prodded impatiently.

 

Radagast waved him off without looking up, his nose nearly close enough to touch the little circle of gold in the bowl. “Oh, these things take _time_ , Gandalf, you know that,” he absently chastised. The wooden bowl was pulled away, held up, moved to his ear, and then brought back under his nose. “It’s definitely malevolent; and what _filthy_ things it says! I feel I shall need to wash my ears out after this,” Radagast looked to Gandalf as he complained and pointed accusingly at the ring.

 

Gandalf sighed. “But is it the _one_ , Radagast?” he prompted with his patience visibly stretched to the limit.

 

At that, Radagast’s expression shifted to something nearly sober. “You can feel his taint just as well as I, Olórin, and this little ring _radiates_ it. You say that the hobbit carried and used it, but wasn’t consumed by it?” Both wizards turned to stare at the peacefully sleeping Bilbo.

 

“He carried and used it, but its darkness was slowly consuming him,” Gandalf admitted sadly. “I noticed that something was different about him, but didn’t push for an answer when he said that it was nothing. Only now, when his will is sleeping and it can torment him, did I truly feel it, and even then I didn’t recognize it until it fell out of his pocket.” Gandalf's face held such self-blame that Thorin couldn’t speak up and break the moment, despite his overwhelming urge to know what was wrong with his hobbit.

 

Gandalf reached out to gently touch Radagast’s elbow. “Will you be able to see it destroyed? I don’t dare trust myself with the task as it has fooled me for so long already.”

 

The ring was deftly dumped from the wooden bowl into a little leather pouch and hidden away in shabby robes. “I’ll see to it, don’t worry about a thing, old friend. My love is for the animals and growing things, and I’m the least of us- I have nothing that it could possibly want to use, so I’ll be safe.”

 

Gandalf immediately grasped the wizard by his shoulders, and then slid his hands up to cup Radagast’s face, weathered thumbs stroking the other’s cheekbones. “Dear Aiwendil, do not say such things,” he scolded. “You are not the least of us, and are likely the smartest- you know when to keep your nose out of what doesn’t concern you, something which I have yet to learn.”

 

Quite unable to help himself, Thorin couldn’t muffle his snort of laughter in time, and the two wizards broke apart, suddenly aware of their attentive audience. Radagast left the tent on his own mysterious errand, and Gandalf quickly followed to avoid awkward questions.

 

“Well,” Nori said as he stepped back to Thorin’s shoulder, “that was interesting. So your hobbit carried a ring which the wizards feel should be destroyed. Did you know anything about it?”

 

Thorin shook his head even as he reached out to card through Bilbo's hair again. “I knew that he had a ring which made him invisible, but knew nothing beyond that. Óin?”

 

“Not a thing. I didn’t even know that it was in his pocket. We had to remove his trousers when we cleaned him up – they carried too much filth from where he sat in the mud – but we left him his little waistcoat as it was clean enough and he shivered so badly even under a blanket,” the dwarf explained. They’d stripped Bilbo down to his shirt, waistcoat, and smallpants, that Thorin could see when Gandalf had removed the blankets.

 

Thorin was about to order Nori to find Gandalf and request the wizard’s return to the tent when Balin entered, box in hand. Thoughts of the wizard fled in the face of what that box represented, and Thorin accepted it with hands that shook slightly. He traced the simple wood grain of its lid with gentle thumbs before he shoved it under his pillow. “The key?” he softly prompted in the face of his memories, and slipped the now-unfamiliar weight around his neck when Balin handed over the dull grey necklace. It had been made out of steel so that it wouldn’t draw his grandfather’s eye, even in his madness, and Thorin could feel its coldness against his skin as its metal took longer to warm than gold. He closed his eyes in shame at that thought, reminded of his own actions, and reached out again to stroke through Bilbo's hair.

 

Only, this time a steadier hand clasped his and stroked it back. Startled, his eyes flew open and Thorin looked across to see a very muzzy and tired-looking Bilbo closely examining the larger hand that he held. “You’re awake!” he yelped inelegantly, and startled the others.

 

Nori and Balin wisely slipped out of the tent as Óin whirled to attend his now-awake patient. Bilbo admirably put up with the pokes, the tugging, and the rewrapping of his leg, but he did fuss a bit when Óin tried to pull Thorin’s hand away from the hobbit’s unexpectedly tight hold. Thorin could have told the healer just how tight those little hands were- as soon as the dwarf tried to pull them apart, the little fingers clamped down quite painfully and Thorin was willing to sacrifice the use of one hand if it meant that pointed little hobbit fingertips would stop digging so deeply into tendon and nerves!

 

Eventually, Óin had to concede defeat, lest he injured Bilbo, and he let the hobbit keep his prize. Thorin swore that he heard a muffled chuckle as the healer turned away, but it wasn’t loud enough to be sure. Nor was he certain whether the sound came from Bilbo or from Óin. “It looks like he’s just fine and waking up on his own. I’m going to find him some clean clothes, now that he’s awake a bit,” Óin stated as he left the tent.

 

Alone with an awake hobbit for the first time, Thorin swallowed heavily. “Bilbo?” Suspiciously clear eyes turned expectantly to face him and Bilbo let him reclaim his hand without fuss. Thorin puzzled a bit over that before he pushed it aside. “I need… I must…” he stopped, took a breath, and tried again, meeting those eyes as he spoke far more frankly than he was accustomed to as he owed the other a grave debt. “I am sorry. My actions were reprehensible, and no explanation of madness excuses them. I can only hope that, in time, I may earn your forgiveness.”

 

Bilbo had pushed himself up a bit on the cot to fold his arms under his head, to better give Thorin his attention, and seemed far more awake than he had when Óin examined him. “You are sincere in your regret?” he quietly asked, and Thorin could do nothing else but nod; the words to describe how he felt just wouldn’t come. “Then I forgive you, my friend.”

 

Thorin gaped before he could rein himself in. “So easily?” he asked faintly.

 

A hard look slanted his way. “It’s not easy, true forgiveness rarely is,” Bilbo lectured, and Thorin’s eyes dropped. “ _But_ , in trying to help you, I did a very bad thing myself, which led to what you did, and so we were both wrong. It’s not in a hobbit’s way to hold a grudge; we anger quickly, but we are also quick to forgive if the request is sincere.” Bilbo's eyes dropped to study the ground. “I must also ask your forgiveness, as I wronged you first, and attempting to help is no excuse for stealing your heirloom. Even when I knew the likely outcome from my actions and believed that I could withstand your punishment.”

 

Thorin’s heart clenched at the reminder and he hurried to stop Bilbo. “No, friend, if you need the words then I forgive you, completely and without reservation, but there is truly nothing to forgive. I was lost in my madness, and all would have been lost to life had you not acted in our interests, so I must thank you for having the bravery to take action even when you knew that it would go badly for you.” He looked up to find Bilbo studying him intently, examining him for whatever reason he couldn’t deduce. He must have met whatever the hobbit was looking for, as Bilbo nodded to himself and awkwardly reached under his shirt’s neck line to pull out a battered little leather bag.

 

He took the moment of distraction to ask the question that he should have asked in the beginning, had Thorin not been weighed down by his conscience. “I meant to ask before I apologized, but how are you feeling?”

 

Bilbo paused for a moment, startled, and his face went a little absent as he thought about the question. His hand even froze with fingers still in the pouch as if he’d forgotten about what he had been doing. “Oh! I suppose I hadn’t… well, I do have a bit of a headache, just a touch, and the back of my right leg feels a bit… tight? There must be a poultice on it, because I can feel that it _should_ hurt, but it doesn’t,” he looked to Thorin as if puzzled by his explanation and Thorin nodded his understanding. The body knew when it was hurt, even if a healer’s tinkering kept the mind from feeling its pain, and Thorin knew that effect all too well. Bilbo then flushed a bit, which turned the ear that Thorin could see a lovely pink color. “I wanted Óin to leave us for a bit, so I pretended that I was still sleepy, otherwise he would have had me up asking all sorts of questions. Meant to give you this for quite a while now, but we never had a good moment alone,” he grumbled the last bit to himself as he suddenly remembered what he had been doing and resumed fishing through the bag before he withdrew something that he held out to Thorin.

 

When the little object dropped into Thorin’s hand, he sucked in a large breath and froze as his senses _crooned_. The feeling was jarring, as Thorin’s stone sense was so very weak that he actually had to be in contact with a stone before he could get the barest sense of it. But this… its purity shook his spirit and brought tears to his eyes. He stared, awestruck, at the indigo gem which sparkled and gleamed so innocently in the grooves of his palm before he clenched the little object in his fist and held it tight to his chest as he looked over to a very surprised Bilbo. “What have you given me?”

 

“It- it’s a stone that we…” Bilbo quickly started, but then cut himself off. With a quick look at the tent’s door, he started again. “I shouldn’t tell you, this is a secret of the Shire,” he seriously imparted, and Thorin nodded- he well understood secrets.

 

“Then don’t tell me. Do not break your vows, and only tell what you can,” he encouraged instead. Thorin _understood_ secrets, and the penalties that they carried for breaking them.

 

Bilbo's face got a funny little look at that, kind of soft and hoping, but with a bit of a twist to it. “Thank you, but no; if what I hope comes to pass, then it’ll be alright,” he reassured and took a moment to gather himself. “Hobbits aren’t like dwarves, elves, or men. When we feel strong enough emotion, we cry and our tear forms a gem. Depending on what the gem is, it’s either kept, given away, or destroyed. The one that you’re holding is a gem of friendship- it came from my feelings for you, when I realized my joy in our friendship, and belongs with you. Rather shameful that I kept it for so long, but I couldn’t find a good time to get you alone to give it to you,” he explained, and Thorin felt that there was _much_ more that was left unsaid, but didn’t pry.

 

Instead, in the spirit of giving hopefully, and with the memory of the little wooden box prodding him, Thorin spoke. “Dwarves don’t just live in stone and mine it, we sense it. It speaks to us, the metals and gems, and the stone itself. I’ve never heard it as my stone sense has always been weak, but your gem speaks to me. _Oh Bilbo, does it ever speak to me_ ,” Thorin breathed.

 

Bilbo grinned mischievously. “Does your stone sense account for why you keep getting lost?”

 

“Yes,” Thorin admitted with a wry look, “and it’s also why I worked with metals as a blacksmith rather than become a jeweler as befitting my station.”

 

Bilbo gaily laughed, and Thorin found that he couldn’t dredge up any anger at being the source of the other’s laughter. “Oh, it feels so _delightful_ to truly laugh again, as if I’ve been dragging a heavy weight behind me for weeks and its chain has finally been severed.” He appeared surprised and so radiantly happy that Thorin smiled along with him. “What does my gem feel like to you? To us hobbits, they’re simply gems, pretty little things.”

 

Thorin closed his eyes and concentrated through the confusing maelstrom of feeling. “It feels like getting a warm hug when you’ve been outside in the cold. Like coming in to find all your favorite dishes laid out on the dinner table. Like… oh!” heat bloomed and Thorin knew that his face flushed under the feeling’s onslaught. His knee gave a warning throb as he shifted restlessly on the cot and his eyes flew open. Thorin sucked in a large breath through his nose to calm his reactions before he either mortally embarrassed himself or set off his knee again; either would have effectively killed the atmosphere.

 

Surprise was written across Bilbo's face, along with a hunger that Thorin recognized. He swallowed, mouth suddenly dry, and fished out the little wooden box with fingers that were made clumsy with nerves. “I have something that I hope…” he started, but was interrupted by first Óin bursting into the tent with an armload of cloth, and then the rest of the company raucously pilled in behind him.

 

Thorin and Bilbo shared a frustrated look before their friends descended upon them, and all hope for privacy was lost in the merry crowd. Their friend was awake and on the mend, and there were eleven ecstatic dwarves who insisted on celebrating this revelation in true dwarven fashion- with as much noise and chaos as possible. Óin and Thorin simply wished for the _celebrating_ to be done a little quieter!

 

All throughout, Thorin kept his precious gem clutched tight in his fist and no dwarf questioned why, though he did receive more than a few smirks and knowing looks from the more gifted members of his company.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1- I don't believe that Tolkien ever uses the word 'coma', or really makes use of 'unconscious' though I cannot lay my hands on an actual book to check (I don't trust online sources as most are interpretations and not verbatim quotes), so my dwarves recognize differing levels of "sleeping" rather than our sleep/unconscious/comatose. 
> 
> 2- For those who didn't twig to it, 'ground air' would be a natural gas, something which would be somewhat common when digging into the bowels of the earth. Miners frequently suffocated in deep mines due to built up gasses, so why shouldn't the dwarves be clever enough to turn that potential menace into good fortune?
> 
> 3- A word on indigo and its place on the color spectrum... yes, it is the color of those lovely brand new blue jeans (before the 'half-destroyed' look became popular) but in the color world indigo contains both blue and purple. Basically, I chose it because Thorin truly *is* a loveable pain in the neck, and Bilbo's friendship accepts both the good along with the bad in a person. Thorin's tear needed to reflect this as well as the heartache he'd put Bilbo through before the tear was cried on top of the Carrock.


	15. Polychromatic

Bilbo awoke in the dark with a gasp and for a moment couldn’t recall where he was. Darkness marbled in his vision, and then clarified into flickering shadows cast by a single candle’s flame as a tall shape crouched by his cot. Still held by dreams and startled, Bilbo pushed over to move away from his unexpected guest and worried why Thorin, ever more alert than he, hadn’t already awoken.

 

“Peace, Bilbo, it is only I,” spoke the form and it moved the candle so that he could easily see a very familiar face. Bilbo's arms collapsed in relief and he dropped back to the cot.

 

“Gandalf, you gave me a start!” he chided. In the three days since he had awakened, their tent had not lacked for company at all. Either Óin was poking about himself or Thorin, much to their mutual displeasure, or a continuous stream of friends and visitors stopped in. This time, though, Bilbo took the lack of privacy with a better humor and simply put up with the well-intentioned chaperoning even if he intended to put a stop to it in the near future.

 

A shuffle from the next cot drew their attention, and Bilbo saw Gandalf lean over, out of the candlelight. Thorin’s heavy and regular breathing resumed, not quite a snore, from where his knee forced him to sleep on his back.

 

The wizard’s eyes met his once again and Bilbo silently allowed the hand which ghosted over his head to spread warmth through his body. “You’re both healing well,” Gandalf stated with a small smile of relief. “Though I shouldn’t be surprised- Master Óin is particularly attentive to his patients and possesses no small talent in the healing arts.”

 

Bilbo smiled at the canny wizard. “What did you just do, my friend?”

 

Caught out, Gandalf sputtered. “Well I…” he recovered his equilibrium and gifted Bilbo with a reproving look which would have been formidable were it not for the crinkles around his eyes which told tale of a smile which was being held back. “I simply felt the state of your wellbeing,” he hedged, and Bilbo gave him a look. “And perhaps I supplemented your healing energy with a small bit of my own,” the wizard admitted, though he defended, “I have more than enough to spare, and Erebor will recover faster with her two heroes back on their feet rather than abed in a healing tent!”

 

“I am no hero,” Bilbo demurred, though he did stifle a laugh at Gandalf's deliberately overblown theatrics.

 

A time-worn hand came up to rest on his cheek. “My friend, the actions which you took to save your friends from themselves were known to the camps of men and elves. After the battle, Dáin’s army mixed with them and learned of the tale for themselves; though dwarves share a love of gold, none quite understood why the men from Lake-Town were originally denied their just petition for reparations. That it escalated to an open siege, with no hoarded provisions in the mountain and against a far superior force, could only be the work of madness, they decided.”

 

Bilbo frowned as he crossed his arms under the pillow to make his head and neck more comfortable and shifted when an injudicious movement pulled a bit at the stitches in his calf. Bothersome things, wouldn’t even allow him to sleep on his side, for the skin pulled. He shook away his aggravation. “But I failed, and I’m a thief! Someone hasn’t told them the entire story if they believe that I’m a hero.” Bilbo scoffed at the very notion. His actions, though he’d meant well, had been far from honorable.

 

“You took great personal risk to try and save your friends from a slow death by starvation,” Gandalf firmly overrode, “and the Arkenstone was more ‘borrowed’ than ‘stolen’ at the time, as you had every intention of it being returned to the mountain.”

 

Laughter interrupted Gandalf's speech. “Borrowed? I ‘borrowed’ the Arkenstone? Gandalf, you have a gift for storytelling! I no more borrowed that cursed stone than you borrowed my ring,” Bilbo managed to gasp out between chuckles.

 

Gandalf went very still. “You know about the ring?” he asked carefully.

 

“Well, yes, of course! Once everyone calmed down about my waking up, Thorin and Nori explained what happened and that it was some kind of evil artifact. Rather made my skin crawl, if you want to know. But the strangest thing about it was that some part of me still wished to run after you and claim my ring back. It was so very odd,” Bilbo confessed with confusion. When he’d been told the fate of his ring, that it was to be destroyed, something inside of him had _wanted_ him to panic and scream at everyone. Had wanted him to hunt the wizards and punish them for taking it from him, but that odd suggestion had brought him up short. He didn’t care about gold, other than to note in passing when an object was pretty, and his conscious mind pulled at that foreign instinct like restless fingers pulled at a raveling thread in a sweater.

 

Old eyes studied him shrewdly and Bilbo fought against squirming. “Do you yearn for that ring still, Bilbo?”

 

“No. Well, not really. Only sometimes, when it’s quiet and I wish to look at it again,” Bilbo stammered as he confessed. He knew that he shouldn’t desire his ring, but a part of him wished to hold it safely in his hands once again. “Thorin explained that it was not healthy for me to keep my ring, that it was similar to one which his father possessed and which lead him to make ill-fated decisions, but I don’t understand how- it’s just a magic ring; it only made me invisible!” Bilbo ranted, and only as he finished speaking did he realize just how loud his voice had become. He flinched and quickly looked over to the dim lump of Thorin’s cot, but only heard even breathing coming from his friend.

 

Chuckles brought his eyes back to Gandalf. “He will not awaken until morning no matter how loudly you wish to shout, my dear Bilbo, though you need not worry about the ring for very much longer. By sunset today it will be destroyed and beyond the reach of any who desire to possess it.” Gandalf ignored Bilbo's wordless moan, which was quite well as it was entirely unintentional and slipped out without his conscious thought. “The ring which Thorin told you about, did you know its story?”

 

In the way that Gandalf sat back and folded his hands, Bilbo sensed that he was to receive a story rather than a lecture, and so settled himself more comfortably on the cot. In that way they spent the wee morning hours ensconced in sweeping tales of evil, conquest, betrayal, and rings of power. By the time that they finished, the lone candle had burned down to a bare nub and Bilbo's blinks were more long pauses before his eyes opened again. During one such pause, he felt a whiskery kiss pressed to his temple and fell deeply asleep as familiar warm energy spread from the spot.

 

When next he woke, it was a slow luxurious surfacing to a familiar sound and a puddle of drool soaked into the pillow under his mouth. Bilbo wiped his cheek and surreptitiously turned the pillow over as he carefully stretched. The familiar sound stopped, and he finally blinked his eyes open to find Thorin regarding him with a fond smile.

 

“You’ve slept into midmorning; did you sleep well last night?” Thorin asked as he set aside a handful of parchment scraps he’d been looking through. It was the rustle of this parchment, as familiar to Bilbo as the scent of his own inks, which had drawn him out of sleep.

 

“Gandalf woke me, early this morning I suppose, or could have been late last night, but after that I slept very well, thank you for asking. How did you sleep?” Politeness ingrained, Bilbo couldn’t help but ask even as he reached across to lace fingers together with Thorin in a caress which they shared in the few moments they found themselves alone.

 

Thorin grimaced ruefully. “I slept deeper than I have in years, though I’m told it was due to that wizard’s meddling.” Bilbo couldn’t help but laugh at the face Thorin made, and the dwarf waited gracefully for his mirth to die down. “Have you noticed anything… unusual about your wound today?”

 

“I hadn’t, but…” Bilbo carefully flexed his leg, expecting a sharp pull of pain from healing tissues and stitches, but received only a dull ache deep in the muscle in response. “Oh, drat that wizard!” Bilbo fussed fondly as he realized that his friend must have meddled with his healing in the night as well.

 

Fingers squeezed his as Thorin chuckled. “Óin was rather flabbergasted when he changed the dressing to find that my knee had suddenly advanced its healing overnight, by just shy of a fortnight if he figures correctly.” He waved a handful of reports from his lap, “The lack of pain which even breathing caused has done much for my concentration, though their contents are still dreadfully dull.”

 

Bilbo laughed gaily, both from the joke and his joy in seeing Thorin find his humor. He took a daring chance and released Thorin’s hand to sit up properly on the cot for the very first time, and was nearly giddy when he only needed to place his calf on a pillow to keep the stiffened tendons from pulling too much. “You have no idea how relieved my _spine_ is,” Bilbo exhaled as he leaned back into the pillow which had once been stuffed under his belly to help keep him partially on his side. He nearly whimpered as the muscles in his back slowly released their knots. Oh, he was _not_ a belly-sleeper, not one little bit!

 

He caught Thorin’s odd look and hastened to explain. “I turn into one giant knot if I sleep on my stomach, which I’ve been doing nothing _but_ , and it feels so good to lie down properly!”

 

Thorin looked down and opened his mouth a few times before he met Bilbo's eyes. “Would you, would you like a massage later? If that’s not too forward to ask,” he hastened to amend.

 

Bilbo's heart raced at the thought, and he was faintly shocked to feel his palms go a bit damp. “I believe that would feel wonderful.” The words came out a bit breathy, but Thorin didn’t appear to notice as he gifted Bilbo with a small but genuine smile and Bilbo realized that he truly hadn’t seen the dwarf smile so freely, except after that horrific battle. He was about to comment on the effect those smiles had on Thorin’s entire face, but was interrupted by Dori bustling through the tent’s door with a loaded food tray leading his way.

 

“Glad to see you awake and feeling much improved, Bilbo! I bet that you’re ready for breakfast,” Dori cheerily called out as he deftly used his foot to scoot over a crate to serve as table for the tray. He swiftly piled a plate high with food, still steaming fragrantly, and pressed it into Bilbo's eager hands. “I believe you can feed yourself this morning, eh?” Bilbo granted him a wide grin before he proceeded to stuff himself at a pace which only barely remained polite. Dori chuckled a bit at his enthusiasm and poured a cup of tea so that it could cool to a palatable temperature while it waited. “As for _you_ ,” Dori turned a stern face to Thorin and passed the surprised dwarf a similarly filled plate, “Óin wants you to eat again, as such rapid healing could only have taxed your body’s resources and he’ll not have you growing ill when you’re meant to be healing.”

 

Bilbo paused in his eating to watch Thorin attempt to stare down Dori, only to silently admit defeat and pick up his fork after the other remained unmoved. Dori simply nodded and poured another cup of tea.

 

“I don’t expect that I need to advise you, of all people, to eat as much as you possibly can, do I?”

 

“I will vow, on my honor as a hobbit, to do my best to eat everything put before me,” Bilbo cheeked back to Dori’s teasing question as he handed back his empty plate. He hadn’t eaten that fast since he was a tween, but his belly was desperately empty, and that could never be tolerated! He accepted a second helping and started in with gusto.

 

Dwalin shuffled into the tent, head down, and drew attention without a word as he handed another stack of parchment to Thorin and hurriedly turned to rush back out.

 

“Hold! Dwalin, come back here,” Thorin was frowning in confusion and Bilbo had slowed his eating to reconsider what he thought he’d seen.

 

Dwalin’s shoulders reflexively hunched before he straightened fully and turned about to Thorin’s order.

 

Forks plinked down against warped metal camp plates as the dwarf’s face, and the cuts and bruises on it, were clearly revealed. “Those marks didn’t come from the battle, they’re far too fresh and still red,” Thorin mused with an unhappy turn to his lips. Dwalin remained silent and stared straight ahead. The two waited each other out until Dori huffed an inelegant snort of disdain.

 

“Oh, the big idiot suggested that Dáin carve up some of his dead boars rather than waste days dragging them afield and cremating them. Said that at least that way they can have, in the words of men, ‘a pig roast’ to provide the camps with food. Dáin was understandably not amused and made sure to show Dwalin his displeasure.” Dori didn’t bother to look up from fixing his tea as he explained and missed seeing Dwalin’s head flush a dull red, but Bilbo witnessed it.

 

Thorin’s eyebrows climbed in surprise. “You wanted to cook and _eat_ Dáin’s boars? Those overgrown pigs that he holds sacred and _babies_ as if they’re his own children? Have you lost your mind, Dwalin?!”

 

Truly, he couldn’t help himself. “Err, what’s the difference between cooking and cremating?” Bilbo had to ask. He knew the culinary difference, as one was edible and the other was ash, but it sounded as if the dwarves had a different outlook on the end product.

 

“He claims that cremating them sets their spirits free,” Thorin turned to explain, and then made a wry face. “I expect it’s also to keep his own people from having a ‘pig roast’ as much as it is from any wish for the boars’ spirits.” They shared a humor-filled look before he turned a very disappointed face towards Dwalin. “You, however, had no justification in suggesting anything of the sort to him as you’ve sat with me through many evenings when we’ve both had to suffer through listening to his bragging about their prowess or moaning when one of them caught a sniffle. You knew what you were going to start when you opened your mouth, old friend, and you’ve earned a week at the latrines. Go see Bifur for a shovel.” Thorin dismissed the thoroughly disgusted-looking Dwalin and turned back to his snack.

 

In no time both plates were cleaned and Dori took himself back out of the tent with the much lighter tray. As he was leaving, Ori darted in around his brother with what looked like the ease of long practice.

 

“Oh, you’re both awake!” he greeted with a wide smile.

 

“Hello Ori, how has your morning been?” Bilbo asked, manners ever-present despite his new and very keen wish to receive a massage from Thorin.

 

Ori’s smile brightened and his slightly still dusty, mitten-covered hands wrung together with restrained energy. “We’ve partially cleared the library!” He nearly shouted, and both Bilbo and Thorin jolted a bit with the surprising volume.

 

“How far in have you cleared?” Thorin interceded as he thumbed through the new pages of reports, and Bilbo assumed that he was looking to see if the library had been included in them.

 

“We’ve cleared as far as the second age histories, but not far enough to reach the back where the vaults are. It’s taking longer than the engineers first calculated because they have to brace as they remove piles, or else more just comes back down.” Bilbo must have looked dreadfully confused because Ori shook his head and backtracked. “The library is one level down, just under the main entrance. Its ceiling is thicker than I am tall, but wasn’t ever built to hold a dragon stomping on top of it, so layers of it flaked off under the strain. It has collapsed shelves, buried everything, and when we clear a section more unstable rock falls down unless the engineers brace the ceiling back up again.”

 

“Have them find a suitably safe room, and then move everything you’re able to rescue from the library to that room as storage until a team can be brought in to refinish the ceiling. We will survive without the old treaties long enough for that,” Thorin decided, and Ori hurriedly nodded before he looked ready to leave. “Also, see if any of the old history and lineage scrolls from the treasury survived the dragon’s tenure and safeguard them as well. They’re not as needed as the treaties are, but they are… I have fond memories of studying them,” he admitted, and Ori bobbed his head in a quick nod again.

 

Bilbo had a daring idea, as his back positively _ached_ and his insides squirmed, and he motioned the fidgeting Ori over closer. “Do you think… could I possibly ask a large favor of you?”

 

“Anything for you, Bilbo, you know that!” Ori agreed without thought.

 

“Well, Thorin and I would appreciate some time alone, to get to know each other without someone else being in the way. Do you think that you could ask the others to possibly not come visit us for a while? Just until lunch, perhaps?” Bilbo wheedled when it looked like Ori would refuse once he’d understood the request.

 

The dwarf’s eyes had gone very wide in surprise. “Oh but I couldn’t, it wouldn’t be proper for you to be alone!”

 

Bilbo gave him his best stern look, the one which he used on his Brandybuck cousins when they got up to their flimflam. “Ori, I’m a middle-aged hobbit and quite respectable in my own right, _not_ some impetuous lad just into his majority. Thorin is likewise well past the age where his desires rule his reason, and requiring a chaperone for us is quite ludicrous. We simply wish to grow closer, without the interference of a third person; is that too much to ask?”

 

Ori visibly wavered as his propriety warred with Bilbo's appeal, and then he broke. “If you promise that you’ll be sensible, then I’ll ask Nori to keep everyone out, but only until lunch,” he threatened them both with a scolding finger, so much like Dori that Bilbo was hard pressed not to laugh. From what he could see of Thorin’s pinched lips and unsteady breathing, he appeared to have the same problem. Ori dashed out of the tent without bidding them goodbye, as if afraid that Bilbo would ask another favor of him, and the two gave in to their mirth.

 

The laughter released that last bit of tightness in Bilbo's heart which had settled in after hearing about what Gandalf did with his old ring. If he could find this much joy without it, then let the wizard do what he wished with it- Bilbo had a life to live and a dwarf to love rather than worry about some silly cold bit of gold.

 

With that in mind, he carefully levered himself off of the cot and limped over to Thorin’s cot. “Budge over- you promised a massage, and I’d like to collect,” he imperiously demanded, though the smirk he couldn’t banish from his lips ruined the haughty image he tried to project.

 

Thorin scrambled, uncoordinated in his haste, to collect the pile of parchment and drop it onto the floor where several sheets fluttered off the top into a disorganized fluff. He didn’t bother to pick them up and instead turned his back on them to awkwardly arrange himself across the cot, injured leg out straight on its pillow and good leg folded up in front for balance.

 

With their injuries, even though far more healed than they were yesterday, the two had to negotiate and move carefully. Bilbo gave up on crawling onto the cot as soon as his calf started to cramp, and instead used his good one to hop up on it backwards and scoot back until Thorin’s hands could grab his waist and help direct him. They did eventually settle into mostly stable positions, each with a leg poking out in front, but they were simply too eager to complain about the odd seating.

 

Bilbo's breath caught as Thorin’s larger hands came up to land gently on his shoulders, and they sat still for precious moments until the thumbs pressed in and began circling firmly against muscle. At that, his head dropped forward on its own and his eyes slid closed. Those hands swept outward to press at the margins of his shoulders, then back in to dance up the back of his neck, and at that Bilbo felt goose bumps break out as those fingers tickled the fine hairs there. The touch firmed again when fingertips trailed down his neck and soothed the goose bumps away, then trailed further down to knead hard thumbs on each side of his spine. Something popped and Bilbo unashamedly _groaned_ with relief as tension abruptly drained out of the middle of his back. That was the worst pain, where he’d had to twist around to see everybody, eat, and drink.

 

“Did that help?” Thorin’s voice sounded a bit uncertain, and his hands had lightened their touch considerably, so Bilbo hastened to reassure him.

 

“Immensely! Don’t worry about hurting my back- I’ve had my cousin Fortinbras walk on it before to get a catch out, and he didn’t hurt a thing,” Bilbo explained, and after a few seconds of silence Thorin’s hands firmed their touch and resumed kneading aching muscles. He luxuriated in the warmth he could feel from them, as he’d removed his waistcoat the night before to wear only a thin cotton shirt rather than his usual layers, and it added another dizzying layer to the massage as his skin tingled with heat even after Thorin moved on. Bilbo's arms weakened under his mental meanderings and he slumped further forward without their bracing, which unintentionally bared his lower back for Thorin’s hands. They moved in without hesitation.

 

Bilbo whined as the too-tight tendons in the curve of his lower back were manhandled into the consistency of wet dough. The hands flattened and spread their warmth across happy muscles before they helped pull Bilbo back upright again.

 

“That’s done it, I have to keep you now,” Bilbo rambled, lost in the blessed feeling of utter painlessness. He could ignore the cramp and burn in his calf, the sharp burn in his groin where the awkward position pulled at tendons on his other leg, and didn’t care one fig about how utterly ridiculous he had to look… none of that really mattered when his back was no longer a torment!

 

Thorin’s chest rumbled with a deep chuckle as those hands helped him lean even further backwards to rest against the dwarf’s solid body, still rather awkward with their legs in the way but enough to send his heart soaring at the contact which he’d longed for. Bilbo felt Thorin twist around for a second, and then a small wooden box was brought around into his view. “My burglar, I am yours to keep if you wish,” Thorin whispered close to his ear, and Bilbo pressed against back against him at the sensation of warm breath tickling over sensitive skin.

 

The little box offered scant opposition and Bilbo had it opened in a trice, though he was puzzled to find Thorin’s indigo gem inside alongside another, far more curious stone. Thorin deftly reached in to pluck his gem out, though his body shook as he did so, and Bilbo was left to pick up the small spear of translucent, colored material. “It’s beautiful, Thorin; what is it?”

 

Arms crossed over his belly from behind to gently hug him tighter to Thorin. “It’s my birth stone, found on the day of my birth and gifted to my parents by the mining guild.” Thorin’s voice by Bilbo's ear had gone a bit distant, lost in memories, and Bilbo laid the box in his lap so that he could wrap his free hand around Thorin’s forearm in support. It must have helped ground Thorin, as he sounded much more present when next he spoke. “Erebor never should have produced a stone such as that, it gave us gold and a wealth of other gemstones, but the stone which you hold in your hand should only have come from the ancient mines of Ered Mithrin. When it was unearthed within an hour of my birth’s announcement, the guild decided that it was an omen from Mahal and took it directly to the royal suite.”

 

Bilbo took advantage of Thorin’s silence to examine the little spear of color in his hands and could scarcely believe that it came from the mountain rather than a wizard’s pocket for the spear, as long as the two end segments on one of his fingers, was a rainbow trapped in stone! To his untrained eye, it didn’t appear as if it had been cut or faceted in any way, simply grew as a straight, octagonal spear, and bands of color in green, blue, and a pinkish red nearly glowed in the tent’s muted light as if the stone had been dipped in potent dye. Bilbo couldn’t believe that anything like this could occur naturally, formed in the earth, and remarked as much to Thorin as he attempted to hand the stone back to the dwarf sitting behind him.

 

“I would have you see _all_ the wonders that the mountain contains, but more than that, Bilbo, I would ask that you keep my birth stone,” Thorin stated as he closed Bilbo's fingers over the little spear. The dwarf’s voice was husky and far more hesitant than he’d ever heard it before, and Bilbo risked cramping muscles to twist around so that he could look Thorin in the face.

 

What he saw, the raw yearning, froze him for a moment. “Why… why do I feel that this isn’t simply about keeping a stone?” he managed to stammer as he restarted his intellect.

 

Thorin helped him finish turning around so that they could somewhat comfortably face each other, and then lifted his hands to trail feather-light fingers along the margin of Bilbo's jaw, down his neck, and arms. Only when he held Bilbo's hands with the rainbow gem cupped between them did Thorin speak. “It’s the traditional way of asking if you’ll,” Bilbo watched as Thorin swallowed and took a breath, “if you’ll marry me.”

 

Bilbo sat in shock as he tried to process the words; his mind looped over and over, desire folding over top of reality. “So… the stone is like your grandmother’s ring?” he asked faintly. Thorin only blinked at him blankly, clearly not understanding the analogy, and that lost look brought Bilbo back to himself. “In the Shire, most families pass on heirloom jewelry as wedding tokens. My Grandma Baggins’s wedding ring was given to my cousin Otho when he wed Lobelia Bracegirdle this past spring.”

 

“A birth stone is no token, passed down through the family,” Thorin explained, and looked more comfortable with the explanation he’d been given. “Normally, a newborn’s parents will seek out a stone which calls to them, and it will remain with their child for the entirety of its life. The stone carries vestiges of its owner’s spirit, and to exchange them is the most intimate gesture that a couple can make, which is why it is the traditional prelude to marriage.”

 

Now Bilbo felt a little lost. “Wait, what? Does this have anything to do with that stone sense you told me about? Because I cannot possibly imagine a stone holding anyone’s spirit, no matter how stunning it is,” he rambled.

 

Thorin actually chuckled at him. “Yes, my little miracle, it does have to do with our stone sense, and all stone has a life of its own. When a piece has been carried close for a dwarf’s life from childhood to marriage, it retains an echo of that spirit so that no matter how many leagues may separate a pair, they always feel close to each other.”

 

At that thought, so tantalizing even though he’d never get to experience the feeling, Bilbo daringly reached out to brush the fingertips of his right hand along Thorin’s temple and thumbed briefly at the strip of grey there at his hairline before he lost his nerve. His hand was captured as it fell, though, and Thorin brought it back up to press a kiss into his palm, and Bilbo shivered at the warm tingles which overwhelmed him at the feeling. His breath caught, and then exhaled in a noisy whoosh.

 

“Of course I will marry you, my overdramatic dwarf,” Bilbo whispered, and both nearly catapulted off the cot as raucous cheers from the tent’s door startled them.

 

Twelve dwarves poured into the tent to clap them on the back and exclaim, repeatedly, that it was “about time!” and the only thing Bilbo could do was hold onto Thorin and try to survive the deluge of well wishes. Thorin’s little rainbow spear remained firmly clenched in his fist, though, no matter how he was jostled about.

 

The sun’s light outside of the tent had significantly dimmed by the time that the group settled down, and Bilbo felt that he’d be bruised _everywhere_ from the enthusiastic congratulations. He was also rather put out that they’d not brought lunch with them, as his belly pinched and groaned its hunger. Apparently Dori believed that Glóin would bring the tray, and Glóin believed that Bombur would supply lunch, and by the end of it no one brought any food at all! After everyone was promised a proper feast afterwards, eventually they all settled; Bilbo and Thorin to their own cots while the rest made themselves comfortable on the ground, with the fragrant Dwalin shoved closest to the tent’s door.

 

“Dwalin, you have a little bit of…” Thorin made a motion towards his cheek, and Dwalin frantically wiped at the imaginary spot of filth until the hooting laughter and catcalls of the others sank in and he grudgingly settled back down. After a few seconds spent catching their breath, the others began to shift self-consciously.

 

“We have a bit of a confession to make,” Bombur hesitantly spoke up when it appeared that no other would.

 

Bilbo watched the dwarves shuffle and shared a look with Thorin as he tried to guess what the twelve could have broken or who they could have offended in the day since he’d seen them last. What he heard next made him go very, very still.

 

“We know about your gems.” Bombur’s words echoed inside of Bilbo's head and he only faintly heard the dwarf continue talking about red and purple gems, but the roaring in his ears drowned out most of the words.

 

His hands fisted in the blanket and the little spear poked uncomfortably into his palm as he tried to keep his reaction calm, tried to keep his face blank, but Bilbo couldn’t control the tremors or the way that terror caused his heart to race inside of his chest. They _knew_. His secret, the one which must be kept to protect not only his life but the lives of everyone in the Shire… these gem-obsessed dwarves knew about it! Knew about him, and he was camped in the middle of a legion of dwarves who he didn’t even know. Who could go gold-mad at any time with Erebor’s treasure hoard within their reach. He couldn’t even run away, as his calf muscles wouldn’t allow walking without uncomfortable cramping, much less running to escape capture! With each exhale, it felt like heavy bands pressed harder around his chest to where he couldn’t draw a full breath, and the tent darkened as if the sun disappeared behind thunderclouds.

 

Voices rose even higher and Bilbo shied away, unseeing eyes clenched closed, from hands which suddenly intruded into his sight to grab onto his hands, shoulders, and face. His breath came in fast pants now as sound and bodies crowded closer and then black swallowed his vision as those hands wouldn’t allow him to protectively curl into himself. The hands abruptly disappeared from his person and Bilbo clenched himself into a tight ball, shuddering as instinct overwhelmed reason. Only one hand returned to run through his hair and he froze as he waited for it to grab, to pull on him as the others did, but it didn’t.

 

Instead, the hand simply continued to card through his hair and even dared to lightly stroke down his spine. Reason tried to reassert itself, tried to tell him that he could trust _this_ hand, and the body attached to the scent so close to his nose, but his traitorous body refused to return control to reason. The voices faded to a low murmur, with one very close to him, and carried on for a long time but by the time that Bilbo had calmed enough to pay attention to what the words meant, exhaustion pulled at his consciousness and dragged him into a fog of sleep. Rapid healing combined with lack of food and severe shock left precious few resources for his body to use in its panic, and it simply shut down. Bilbo wasn’t aware of Thorin straightening him out, or of being tucked gently under the blanket after the company had been sent out of the tent on a mission, suitably chastised for their actions.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay my loyal readers, I am very grieved to admit that the last two chapters *may* be a tad delayed- I lost my job this past week, and while it wasn't entirely unexpected it's still extremely stressful and panic-inducing. Not exactly the right frame of mind to write the stubborn chapter sixteen which had been stalled for two weeks already (though I'd built in a padding of chapters between what you were reading and what I was working on, that's gone now) and I'm very much afraid that with where my head is the happy Thorin/Bilbo interaction that I *should* be writing may end up becoming dark and tense instead. Sabrina, bless her generous soul (I still don't know what I did in a previous life to deserve a friend as wonderful as she's been), has agreed to proof read for me while my beta is concentrating on finals and graduation but the ideas are coming about as slowly as molasses left out in a Siberian winter. I know what I *want* to put down, it's on the outline and all, but the flow just isn't happening. The concentration isn't there.
> 
> This WILL be finished. I'm too stubborn to leave it and I dearly love the world that I've created too much to just walk away from it without seeing it through to the end. But I may end up having to take longer to write the chapters than one simple week... particularly since the last two chapters are slated to be fairly large and not the usual 2-4k words that the others have averaged. What little bit I have done of sixteen is already 4,600 words, and it's barely covered even half of what I had planned for it in the outline :)
> 
> Please don't misunderstand the message, I'm not trying to be a downer, but I do firmly believe in warning those who have loyally stuck with me ever since the beginning that things may not go as smoothly for these last two weeks as they have for the fifteen that went before them. Take care, lovelies, and hope that you've enjoyed the chapter!


	16. Opalescent

Bilbo blinked himself out of the depths of sleep only to find a dimly-lit room before his eyes. He puzzled over it as he stretched, toes curling under the blanket in delight at the plush softness under… him… wait, what? He bolted upright and very nearly yelped as someone nearby jumped at his sudden move. Light flared, painful to his dark-adapted eyes, and a mirrored lamp brightened the room more than the single candle on the table had.

 

“Thorin, where are we?” Bilbo asked, nearly in a panic as he took in the stone walls around him and the soft bed, an actual bed, upon which he was sitting. Last he remembered… wait, exactly what did he remember? Bilbo racked his memory as he frantically tried to recall limping up to the mountain, or anything about the move, but he couldn’t.

 

Thorin’s hands engulfed his where they clenched at the bedding, and Bilbo's eyes flew up to stare at his beloved… his _betrothed_? Oh, sweet Yavanna how badly his lonely heart wished for that, but his garbled memories didn’t make much sense at all and he was so confused! “You must calm yourself, my beloved light, or you’ll panic again and Óin won’t be very pleased with me,” Thorin spoke with a low voice, and stroked his hands gently. Bilbo couldn’t help but follow his advice, not when his dwarf used _that_ tone which rumbled so deeply in his chest, and found his breath coming easier than before.

 

“What- what happened? When did I panic? Weren’t we in the tent earlier?” He asked rapidly, and then had to break off as his throat went dry and he croaked the last words. Thorin hastily reached for the tray beside the shaded lamp and poured a cup of water for him from a chipped earthenware ewer which looked like it had lost a fight with a flight of stairs. Bilbo greedily gulped down the room-temperature water and nodded towards the ewer in a request for more. The second cup, though, he sipped slowly so that it wouldn’t come back up; he’d learned the hard way as a faunt to never binge on water… it always came back up the hard way, usually out his nose as well, which always made the event _that_ much more miserable. He’d rather avoid that indignity if he could, especially as he had the suspicion that he’d already made a spectacle of himself earlier.

 

Bilbo shifted up to sit against his pillows and patted the space beside him in an invitation which Thorin didn’t hesitate to accept. His dwarf limped over, surprisingly barefoot, and made himself comfortable at Bilbo's side.

 

“Now, tell me exactly what happened? My memories are a bit… muddled,” Bilbo prompted and snuggled into Thorin’s side.

 

The dwarf explained that the company knew about Bilbo's tears, and that every hobbit could produce them, thanks to Gandalf. Thorin reassured Bilbo that the wizard only shared his knowledge after being threatened by Balin. Worse, to Bilbo's mind, was Thorin’s later admission that the company had collected and disposed of both his red and purple gems… with the exception of one each which they kept for Thorin to experience.

 

He felt both reassured that the dwarves weren’t locking him up to obtain his gems, and also terrified of how this knowledge would change his standing among his friends. Would they see him as an oddity, a freakish creation of the Valar? Would they see him as a walking treasure chest who could refill their coffers anytime they needed extra gems to sell? Or could he possibly, improbably, keep his place in their group and hearts?

 

“Bilbo? Do I need to call for Óin?” Thorin’s worried voice broke through Bilbo's frantic spiral of thoughts, and he jumped as he realized that he’d lost track of everything.

 

He started to shake his head no, but his stomach interrupted with a fierce growl and they shared a chuckle. “It seems that I’m simply hungry,” Bilbo covered his lapse with the handy excuse. Thorin shouted through the small chamber’s partially-open door for a tray of food to be brought and a faint confirmation echoed back to them.

 

Reminded of his odd circumstances, Bilbo gently elbowed Thorin’s side and gestured to the room. “How did I come to be here, and where _is_ here? Are we inside Erebor?” The candle and dim lamp didn’t illuminate much, but the chamber did not appear to be large at all and seemed unadorned aside from the meager furniture which took up its space.

 

“We are indeed inside Erebor. After the company explained their tale, I ordered them to make ready the rooms and then had us moved into the mountain before you awoke,” Thorin stated proudly as he followed Bilbo's gesture and looked around the room with a proprietary gaze. “In their first reports, Dáin’s assayers vowed that the royal apartments remained solid and were untouched by the dragon’s greed, so I had earlier asked Balin to oversee the cleaning of rooms for the company’s habitation- flimsy fabric tents may please elves, but _we_ will only accept stone walls around us for protection, especially with winter’s bite approaching. Our most critically injured have already been moved into the lower craft and guild halls, where the healers have enough room to move, but Nori and Dwalin refused to allow us to be housed there.” Thorin made a face, and Bilbo assumed it was aimed at the overprotectiveness of the two dwarves. “They _graciously_ approved our being housed in the royal apartments, but only if you and I used the back two suites while they took the two nearest the Western Hall doors.”

 

Bilbo smothered a laugh down into something like a giggle. “So you’re not even sleeping in your own bedroom?”

 

Thorin ruefully shook his head. “No, you and I are sleeping in rooms reserved for the few of our cousins who once lived with us in the mountain. Fíli claimed my old set of rooms while Kíli claimed his mother’s. The rest of them paired off, except for Glóin who snores loudly enough that no one else wished to sleep near him now that they had the option and Óin who asked for room enough in which to craft healing supplies.”

 

“If we’re in the royal apartments, then who is sleeping your grandfather’s rooms?” Bilbo assumed that had to feel incredibly awkward, sleeping in a king’s old set of rooms.

 

“No one is- this wing is for the family; the king’s apartments are one level above us. Tradition dictates that they be separated, to discourage an overly ambitious heir from assuming the throne before his time, over the still-warm body of the previous king. Our line never experienced such treachery, but they still observed the old exhortations when they carved and settled Erebor…”

 

“Only because Durin’s line tends to die young, in foolish ventures, lad. Don’t let this proud idiot convince you otherwise,” interrupted Óin as he stomped through the door, one hand occupied with his valise and the other slammed their door fully open to admit Bombur who carried a full tray in both hands. As the dwarf went to sit the tray down on the little table so that he could turn up the lamp, Bilbo's eyes narrowed at it in concentration- it looked surprisingly like the lid from a barrel rather than a tray…

 

Óin rounded on Bilbo as Thorin, the traitor, scooted off the bed to lounge on the chair instead. “Now, Master Baggins,” he began, and Bilbo internally cringed- that was the same tone his mother used when he was in trouble as a faunt, “you are going to sit still and quiet as I look you over to make sure that you’ve not set yourself back any with that foolish stunt. I don’t know what you were thinking, lad!”

 

True to the healer’s command, Bilbo cooperated with every motion and grunt, lifted and flexed his leg and meekly sat still for Óin to press his ear trumpet against his chest and back to listen to his heart and breathing. When the healer finished, Bilbo sighed in relief and reflexively ducked under Óin’s carelessly out flung arm as he dismissed Bombur. Only then did Bilbo get to see that Bombur had used the time Bilbo spent being poked and prodded by Óin to fill two battered plates with some kind of roast meat with gravy and thick slices of bread. One plate, which Óin gently shoved into his hands, even had a small portion of cooked cabbage on it, and Bilbo's chest warmed at the thoughtfulness of his friend.

 

Óin left Thorin to fill his own plate, immune to the irritated glare which the other dwarf flashed his way, and made himself comfortable on the foot of Bilbo's bed without an invitation. “Now, has Thorin told you everything that happened yesterday?”

 

Caught with a mouthful of roast, Bilbo had to chew quickly and swallow. The food went down like a stone and tasted like ashes as his mouth suddenly went dry. “Erm… he’s, well, he’s told me that you lot know how your gems were made, that it was Gandalf who told you,” Bilbo tentatively explained.

 

Óin looked at him expectantly, and Bilbo hated how his voice wavered as he admitted, “And that you kept some of my _other_ gems.” Óin sighed and reached up to pinch the bridge of his nose.

 

“Aye, that’s the least of it.” The healer sent a flat look at Thorin, who wouldn’t meet his eyes. Now Bilbo wondered what could have happened if Thorin felt… what? Guilty? Ashamed? Nervous? He’d always had difficulty in reading the dwarf’s face, and this time was no different. Bilbo blamed it on the beard, as he could always read the more expressive bare hobbit faces.

 

“Eat, and I’ll tell you what you need to know,” Óin prompted Bilbo into eating again, though he didn’t taste a single bite through his worried preoccupation. “After you passed out, we explained to Thorin how our gems are created and that all hobbits are capable of such a feat. He couldn’t believe us, as he didn’t witness it like we did. Shocked us in our boots, it did, and I’ve never seen Balin so furious before as when he saw you crying those purple ones; he’d had previous experience with them as a youngling, Balin had, and knew that they didn’t feel the same as your nice blue ones do. He was ready to fling that wizard off the mountainside before having him escorted out of our borders because he thought you’d been foully-spelled to produce them.

 

“Gandalf only explained about the gems and how they’re created to calm our fury, not because he was interfering. For once,” Thorin interrupted with a snort of laughter, which Bilbo and Óin echoed as during the journey they too had grown to know Gandalf's sneaky ways. “You could have knocked us all over with a feather, lad, when we finally understood that we held your _tears_ in our hands. The next day we crushed your red gems into dust which we scattered to the wind, and dumped the purple into the River Running to be washed away, exactly as Gandalf described. Did we perform your rites correctly?” Óin did look uncertain then, and it helped Bilbo's chest unclench from the tight knot that had been tightening as he listened.

 

“You, ah, you disposed of them correctly, yes. But you never should have had them in the first place- they were my duty to look after, as… as they were created from my pain.” Bilbo tried to explain, unnerved by openly speaking of such a sensitive topic with someone who wasn’t another hobbit. Truly, he shouldn’t even broach such a conversation even with another hobbit!

 

Pain was a subject which they studiously avoided as they felt its bite deeply and his people preferred to seek out the cheerful and uplifting instead. Good food, good drink, the warm comfort of having spouse and children close… that is what hobbits preferred to speak about when meeting over a pint and plate piled high with treats. Never pain, never sorrow; those were dealt with at home, behind a locked door, and shamefully disposed of before others could see the evidence. Even his closest and most beloved cousins had never set eyes on the jar of tears and tear shards which he’d collected in the wake of his parents’ deaths, when pain of the heart swamped his spirit and apathy towards his own life, listless neglect, brought pain of the body to join in his misery. Those same cousins had left him, alone and bereft, to deal with his pain as best he could, and he’d gone numb until a pack of dwarves annoyed, shocked, aggravated, and loved him back into feeling again. Bilbo's chest warmed at the thought of his friends even as he readied himself to argue with the healer.

 

Óin forcefully shook his head and thrust his cup of water, refilled by Thorin, at him which forced Bilbo to hurriedly stuff the chunk of bread he held into his mouth to free his hand for the cup or else he’d have had a wet lap. He frowned at Óin but couldn’t complain as he was busy trying to chew the too-large mouthful of dense dwarven bread. “There I’d have to disagree with you, and I think that every one of the lads would as well. You’re our friend and were too ill to look after the task yourself, so it was our honor to do it for you.” Óin squinted at him as Bilbo tried to hurriedly swallow the partially-chewed mouthful so that he could reply and nearly choked himself.

 

“Lad, I think no one has explained to you just what it means when a dwarf calls you ‘friend’, have they?”

 

Bilbo simply shook his head, resigned to more chewing. He couldn’t tell if Bombur or one of Dáin’s dwarves made the bread, but he’d never had a more dense, chewy mix in all of his life, though he could see that Thorin wasn’t having a bit of problem with it. His betrothed had stuffed nearly half of his first slice into his mouth and ate it with as much ease as Bilbo ploughed through scrambled egg. He mentally grumbled to himself about dwarves having an unfair advantage.

 

“Help an elf over a mud puddle, or hand him a handkerchief and he’ll call you elf-friend. They used to be the silliest creatures, back before the Greenwood fell into shadow, and loved everyone they met. We dwarves are more guarded with our hearts and far more particular in who we choose but once you’re called ‘friend’ by one, that dwarf will move a mountain to stand by your side should you need him. We take great honor in looking after and caring for our friends, because we collect so few.”

 

The lump in his throat silenced Bilbo this time, as he truly understood for the first time that he was safe- completely safe, secret and all. That knowledge gave him the reassurance necessary to swallow and speak up with a request which otherwise he never could have made. “Could… would you please ask the others to join us? There’s something I must do, and I’d like to have them here if they don’t mind,” he croaked, throat still tight with mingled emotion from Óin’s words and fear of what he planned to do.

 

Óin eyed him carefully, and Bilbo suspected that he’d gone dreadfully pale, especially as he felt rather light-headed at the moment, but the dwarf eventually nodded and stepped out of the room.

 

“I _really_ need a hug,” Bilbo motioned for Thorin to join him, and nearly ordered his betrothed to his side even as he nearly cringed at his own presumption. Their hug was slightly awkward due to the height difference between Thorin standing beside the bed and him sitting on it, but Bilbo didn’t care at all. He burrowed into Thorin’s tunic-clad chest and let himself tremble while strong arms hugged him tight to sturdy warmth.

 

A kiss was pressed to the top of his head. “If it bothers you so badly, you needn’t carry out your plan,” Thorin assured him. The words echoed through to Bilbo's ear where it pressed against Thorin’s chest, and he squeezed tighter for just a moment before he leaned back to look Thorin in the eye. The dwarf obligingly released him, though his hands slipped down Bilbo's arms to comfortingly hold his hands in a firm grasp.

 

“No, I _truly_ do need to do this, and…” Bilbo centered himself and took a deep breath as he did his level best to push away the old fear which threatened to well up again. “I want our friends to be here to witness it,” he stated firmly. He gathered his courage together, tugged on Thorin’s hands to pull the dwarf in closer, and leaned up to press their lips together in their first real kiss.

 

Their lips had barely brushed together when stomping and clomping echoed down the hallway to warn them of the coming interruption, and they pulled apart with a rueful look before the company piled through Bilbo's doorway. Kíli was on his brother’s back, and nearly drove Fíli to his knees with a knee to a kidney, and their tumble tripped up Glóin and Dori. Grumbles could be heard above Fíli’s yelp and Kíli’s cackles along with yelled threats from a yet-unseen Dwalin. Bilbo stood from his bed and shared a fond look with Thorin as everyone found a place to stand and the sounds of fists meeting armored bodies died down to faint shuffles. He tried fruitlessly to tidy up his shirt, horribly wrinkled from being slept in, and had to give it up as lost.

 

Bilbo slipped his hand inside of Thorin’s and felt a reassuring squeeze. “I know that you all overheard Thorin ask me to marry him, and my acceptance,” he started. Most of the dwarves looked curious, though Ori had the decency to appear somewhat abashed for having eavesdropped on their private moment. “In… in the Shire, we have a tradition between betrothed couples, and I’d like for all of you, my friends, to witness it.” Bilbo barely managed to get the words out through lips clumsy with nerves, and he fumbled as he fished his little pouch out from under his shirt. Unfortunately, this meant letting go of Thorin’s hand so that he could dig through to find what he needed, and he missed the warmth and connection that it offered.

 

“This is not to be shared around,” Bilbo firmly stated as he made eye contact with each dwarf around him. They all gravely nodded back with not a grin or eye twinkle in sight, and he had to hope that they understood just how momentous and terrifying this was for him. “First, I have to explain a bit about hobbits so that you’ll better understand our tradition. When a hobbit babe is born, its tears are the same as any of men or dwarves- clear and fluid. Its eyes are not ready to produce the correct tears, and actually cannot see color until much later.” Bilbo could see Óin perk up, likely with a list of questions in his head, but the dwarves all held their silence.

 

“As the babe grows into a faunt its body matures but, more importantly, its emotions mature to where it no longer cries from a wish to be fed, clothed, cleaned, or put down for a nap. Its attention also turns outward towards the world around it with a child’s curiosity, and when the body and emotion are both mature enough, the faunt’s tears become like those cried by an adult hobbit.” Bilbo smiled to himself and felt his chest warm as he remembered his own experience. “The first tear cried is always the most special, because it’s shed the first time that the faunt sees the world in color- imagine living in a world of greys, and then one morning you wake up to glorious color! The sky is so vividly blue, the grass a palette of greens, and oh- the _impossible_ colors of the flowers! One cannot help but cry in the face of such beauty, and that very first tear is kept by the hobbit for a very special event.”

 

Bilbo held out the little gem which he’d held shielded with his fingers, and carefully placed it into Thorin’s hastily-lifted palm. “As my beloved, the only one who I wish to marry, I gift you with my first tear as a symbol of all that I am. Because it’s my very first, when my eyes weren’t used to crying the tears which create gems, the gem was formed as they all are- mostly clear and the surging mix of emotion at the time gives it the streaks of colors which run through it.”

 

Astounded, Thorin held the tiny round gem in his hand as if it were as fragile as a soap bubble. In testament to Bilbo's words, it sat against his skin just like a nearly clear opal, with beautifully brilliant threads of color dashed through it. Bilbo watched it glimmer in the yellow lamp light and somewhat smugly thought to himself that it truly was the most magnificent of first gems, if he did say so himself; mostly round, not lopsided or lumpy, with just the perfect amount of color to it, unlike the stories of _horribly_ malformed gems his friends had whispered about as a faunt.

 

The others crowded around, but were careful not to jostle or even touch Thorin, to better see his tiny little wonder. “Leave…” Thorin croaked and had to clear his throat. “Leave the room, _now_!” he barked when several dwarves appeared as if they would protest the pair being left alone, but all filed out of the door, which they carefully left open. As soon as they were alone, Bilbo found Thorin’s free hand cupping the back of his neck to gently pull his head in so that their foreheads could press together.

 

“My Bilbo, I wish that you could feel your gems as I can- this one gem makes my spirit wish to climb to the top of Erebor and fly with the eagles, it resonates so with wonder and excitement. I humbly accept your gem, and vow to protect this piece of yourself just as I will protect _you_ , beloved,” he stated with such grave sincerity that Bilbo couldn’t help but believe him.

 

Bilbo pulled back just enough to tip his head around Thorin’s rather beak-like nose, and fitted their lips together in the best response he could give to such a vow. Thorin’s hand pulled him in closer to deepen the kiss, but before they could become too lost in exploring each other a throat cleared pointedly from the hallway and they reluctantly broke apart. “Eventually, they will have to stop interrupting us, or I shall be forced to do something unpleasant,” Bilbo panted, short of breath from arousal and highly frustrated with interfering dwarves.

 

“It is our way,” Thorin chuckled, though he appeared similarly effected by their kiss. He stepped back to pull a pouch, similar to Bilbo's though it appeared to be freshly-made if Bilbo judged accurately from the light color of its leather, out from under his tunic and retrieved a very familiar stone. “I didn’t know where you wanted to put this for safekeeping, so I held onto it until you awoke,” Thorin explained.

 

Bilbo eagerly took possession of his little spear of stone again, and couldn’t help the sappy grin which pulled at his lips as he did so. His chest felt two sizes too small as he watched Thorin carefully tuck his tear away in the little pouch, tie it closed, and then hide it away again… Bilbo knew that he made the right decision to give it, as this feeling could only be love, and his smile grew wider at that thought. He took a moment to safely stow the colorful striped stone in his pouch before he pulled himself into Thorin’s arms for another hug. “I do love you, did you know?” Bilbo asked facetiously, and felt Thorin’s body shake as he openly laughed.

 

“And I love you as well, my light,” Thorin murmured above him just before he dropped a chaste kiss to Bilbo's forehead.

 

“You’ve called me that before, your light, what does that mean?” Bilbo's forehead furrowed as he tried to think over all possible reasons for the pet name, but to his consternation no ideas came to mind.

 

Thorin moved one hand from holding Bilbo's back to instead run fingers through Bilbo's hair, gently untangling the strands as he did so. “Without light, where we live is as black as pitch, and can be quite deadly unless one is able to see one’s way. A light can be the difference between life and death, even knowing if the air is safe to breathe in a deep tunnel, or between being lost and being found, inside the mountain. Just as a lamp lights our path, our spouse is our light in life and guides us safely through the decades. That is why we call them our _lukhudel_ , or most brilliant of lights; sometimes the thought of their husband or wife is the only reason why a dwarf has survived what should otherwise have killed them.”

 

“That is so beautiful,” Bilbo whispered, struck by both the practicality and poetry in the reasoning of dwarves. “Can you teach me more of your language? I’ve heard the others speak it before, they quit guarding their tongues around the time that we escaped from the goblins, but I cannot grasp it- it’s not like Westron or Sindarin.”

 

“If that is your wish, then I’ll ask for tutors once more dwarves return to the mountain; the ones who teach the younglings will be among them, and they would be the most suitable for what you seek,” Thorin then thoroughly astonished Bilbo when he pulled back and dropped to one knee, a grunt of pain not fully muffled as his injured knee bent more than it had previously been forced to. “Anything you wish I will strive to make happen, as I can never repay the pain that I’ve caused you, the pain that I felt when I held your red gem in my hand. I will spend the rest of my life with you as my first thought, my first priority even before this mountain, as we would not have our home if not for you. I will spend the rest of my life working to repair my flaws and make myself a better husband for you, this I vow.” Thorin brought Bilbo's hands to his mouth and kissed the back of his knuckles, and it felt far too ritualistic for Bilbo's comfort.

 

“You, ah, don’t need to vow anything, love, as I’m sure that you’ll be a fine husband. And I’ve already forgiven you for your actions that day, so you have no reparations to make,” Bilbo tried to reassure him, but by the stubborn jut to Thorin’s jaw, he could see that the dwarf was determined in his ideas. Slightly more experienced in dealing with Thorin and his moods, Bilbo sighed and decided to shelve that particular argument for another day when they both weren’t still aching from mostly-healed wounds.

 

He was startled out of his thoughts as Thorin stood from the floor with a stumble and grimace, and Bilbo ducked under his arm to help support his bad side as he carefully straightened out an uncooperative knee. Together they shambled stiffly over to sit on the edge of Bilbo's bed and shared a rueful laugh at themselves- they did make quite the pair.

 

***

 

Four days later, Bilbo sat back as he watched Thorin pace, handful of parchments for his secret project in his hand. “Please sit down before you make me dizzy. He’s your kin, love, I don’t think he’ll abandon you or laugh at your proposal, so you don’t need to worry,” he tried to reassure Thorin, but only received a grunt in reply. Bilbo breathed deeply and refrained from throwing something heavy at his betrothed’s head. He was fairly certain that it wouldn’t hurt the dwarf, but it wasn’t in his nature to spuriously break items, no matter how vexed he became.

 

Ready to stand and force the issue by giving Thorin the option to either sit down or step on top of him, Bilbo's threat was stayed by the arrival of Dáin followed by Balin and Fíli. When Thorin sat to his side, Bilbo gently kicked out to his left and nudged his dwarf’s shin; he sent a fond but exasperated look when all Thorin did in return is shuffle his mysterious collection of odd-sized cuttings of parchment and remain silent.

 

Dáin, finally, broke their stalemate. “If you only wanted to sit and stare at my sculpted good looks, cousin, I can have my son send over a painting with our next shipment of food,” he taunted, and finally received a reaction from Thorin.

 

At last aggravated enough to look up from his study, Thorin fixed a glare at his cousin. “Dáin, you look like one of your boars tried to eat your nose and didn’t like the taste… that’s _not_ the definition of chiseled, that just means your wife is charitable.” Dáin sputtered as he tried to yell in protest but only ended up laughing at the all-too-accurate jibe. Balin looked down at the table and covered his mouth with a hand to hide his mirth while Nori openly howled, face red.

 

“Thorin, why did you call us all here?” Bilbo tried to redirect the conversation before it went too far out of control. The dwarves could spend _hours_ insulting each other in the name of fun, if left to their own devices, and if Thorin did not get to the point of the meeting then Bilbo would take himself off in pursuit of a more enjoyable way to pass the time… a nap, perhaps.

 

“I have had an idea which I wish to hear your opinions on before I order the work done,” Thorin finally stood from his chair and laid the handful of parchment scraps on the table. He paused in thought. “Though the Arkenstone has been the symbol of my family’s right to rule, it has also been at the heart of too much division, both inside the seven kingdoms and outside of them. Even when we sought to retake our homeland, greed and hidebound tradition kept the envoys from even the smallest offer of aid unless we possessed the King’s Jewel, and that is unacceptable. When Smaug first attacked, we were left without aid, and that too is unacceptable!” Thorin thundered before he slammed his fist onto the table. Bilbo nearly jumped out of his skin, and received a somewhat sheepish smile from Thorin who made every effort to calm himself.

 

“What I propose is an alliance between Erebor, the Iron Hills, Mirkwood, and Dale once it is rebuilt- I plan to have the Arkenstone broken down into four pieces which will be mounted into medallions to link our kingdoms.” Thorin took his seat to shocked silence and Bilbo could suss out a tiny little smug smile around the corners of the dwarf’s mouth.

 

He knew that he was gaping but couldn’t gather enough of his wits to stop… Thorin, who had launched their insane quest and set them after a _dragon_ for the sake of that silly jewel, now proposed to destroy it and hand out the pieces? Bilbo thought to himself that he’d need to find Óin to check Thorin over for major head trauma, for this had to be some kind of waking hallucination! Finally Nori and Balin managed to get their mouths working and nearly shrieked their objections at Thorin in one unintelligible mess, over top of each other. Dáin simply stared down at the table with a very intense face.

 

“Thorin, I can’t accept,” Dáin’s booming voice easily cut over the mixed squabbling and silence fell over the room again. “Lad, I did you an injustice earlier by not honoring the request you made at enclave and that’s a shame I’ll bear ‘till I rest in the halls with the rest of our kin. I’d rather sign a contract of allegiance between the Iron Hills and Erebor pledging our support as long as an heir of Durin sits on both thrones- that will be the forfeit to satisfy my honor.”

 

There was a sharp intake of breath to Bilbo's left. “Dáin, any debt you may have owed was more than repaid when you came to our rescue; we don’t need a contract between us to assure assistance in the future.” Thorin waved his hands as if to shoo the very idea away, but Dáin interrupted.

 

“Despite my own feelings, Thorin, it’s also for the best politically: if we follow your idea, there’d be a coalition of one kingdom of elves, one kingdom of men, and _two_ kingdoms of dwarves… that kind of imbalance would only prove disastrous over time as the others could accuse us of colluding together against them, and differences and politics would tear the alliance apart from the inside. Besides, we’re too far away to visit regularly for assemblages, and that would slow progress. It’s better that Erebor stands with Mirkwood and Dale, with the three of you living so close together, and the Iron Hills will stand at your backs if you need us.”

 

Balin nodded wisely and sent a significant glance at Thorin. Bilbo watched his betrothed’s face smooth into a look of resigned acceptance. “If that is what you wish, then I’ll have Balin and Ori draw up the contract.” Thorin picked up the bits of parchment and shuffled them before he laid them back down in front of him again. As his beloved grimaced down at his hard work in dismay, Bilbo could now see that they contained detailed sketches and diagrams for Thorin’s proposed medallions. “Though it does mean that I’ll need to think up new cuts for the Arkenstone and alter the medallions’ settings… do you have any jewelers among your soldiers? I have an engraver in my company who can etch the decorations, and we have a gold smith, but I would ask to borrow a jeweler or two if you have any.”

 

“I have four: one master, his two apprentices, and one journeyman. You may borrow them all while we’re still here, and keep the journeyman while you’re at it. She needs to do her trials before the guild can review her mastery and helping to set up your craft spaces once again would give her experience that she can’t find in the Orocarni or our own halls.” Dáin tapped rhythmically on the table with his short, stubby fingers, and Bilbo's eyes were drawn to several that were crooked- broken long ago and healed slightly out of alignment. He grimaced to himself- only idiot dwarves went out of their way to avoid healers!

 

A hand calmly reached over and squished Dáin’s fingers flat onto the table to still the drumming, and Bilbo's eyes followed the arm up to see Balin with a chastising look on his face. Dáin snorted and tugged his hand free as he stood. “If that’s all, cousin, I’ll send them to your work rooms in the morning. Need to get back to my troop, where they actually _respect_ me,” he glared playfully at an unimpressed Balin, “and those idiots may just bring down your mountain if I leave them alone too long.”

 

Thorin stood, limped around the table, and gave his cousin a hearty embrace which included a round of back slaps hard enough to make Bilbo flinch in sympathy. Dáin then left, his own limp extremely evident, and Bilbo frowned in confusion. “Was he injured too?” He hadn’t heard anything about Dáin or his troops, but then he hadn’t directly asked either.

 

“No worse than any of us were, lad; bruises and a few breaks, couple rattled heads.” Balin looked at him curiously in return.

 

Bilbo's forehead furrowed as he mentally reviewed Dáin’s gait against Balin’s claim. “If he wasn’t injured in the battle then why is he limping so badly? And why does he _clunk_?” he scratched behind his ear and turned to peer at Thorin, who smiled widely at him in amusement. Bilbo ignored Nori’s snickers and pointedly raised his eyebrows at his love who obviously knew the answer and was withholding it purely to vex him.

 

Seconds passed and Bilbo maintained his expectant look while Nori laughed himself under the table and Balin sighed at their antics, but Thorin didn’t break eye contact or lose his infuriatingly smug expression until Bilbo had enough. He suddenly grinned widely enough to expose teeth and then kicked out with his toes rigidly together and cheerfully frogged Thorin right in his calf. He carefully avoided the knee, but took amusement from Thorin’s startled yelp as the dwarf reached down to rub at the knotted muscle.

 

“Fine, you win! For being soft creatures, your feet are like _iron_ ,” Thorin swore, but Bilbo could see the affection lurking in his expression as he straightened. “As a youngling, Dáin was dared to run through the breeding pens, and a temperamental old boar charged him. Pinned him up against a support and crushed his lower leg before the handlers could kill it; the bones were too badly mangled to be saved, and the healers had to amputate the leg just below his knee. He’s walked with a forged iron leg ever since, and that’s what you hear,” Thorin finally explained.

 

“Oh, thank you for explaining” Bilbo breathed softly as he tried to imagine walking with a chunk of iron attached to the end of his leg. His estimation of Dáin increased, though his estimation of dwarven common sense fell sharply- to nearly lose a life, and to actually lose a limb, on a _dare_ was idiotic!

 

But still, Bilbo thought as he sent Thorin an appreciative look, dwarves may not have the sense the Valar gave a hobbit, but he absolutely adored _his_ dwarf- faults and all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here is my image of Bilbo's tear gem: <http://akblake1.tumblr.com/post/87418112054/bilbos-very-first-tear-gem-for-those-whod-get-a>
> 
> And 'lukhudel' technically means "light of (all) lights" but as those who speak *any* language know, no one ever uses their own words as they exactly mean. Here, it's being used as "brightest of all lights" which would be a more colloquial translation of that extremely unwieldy mouthful.
> 
> To all my readers: I've run into a large problem... my best friend (my Samwise) is no longer willing to read chapters and help with inspiration/ideas, and my beta is too busy with college to really do the job. Would any of my beloved readers like to step forward to help close out this fic? If you're interested, please email akblake1@gmail.com

**Author's Note:**

> Please review if you liked or disliked- letting me know what I got right/wrong helps me to improve the next chapter, and any particularly liked bits may make a reappearance :)
> 
> 'Tears' now has art!! I am completely blown away by the thought that this little fic of mine could move anyone to spend their time and talent making art for it, and grateful beyond words that they've decided to share it for the rest of us to enjoy!
> 
> \- Srapsody's art, which covers chapters 1, 2, 5, and 6: <http://srapsodia.tumblr.com/post/85170122024/i-did-a-few-sketches-from-the-fic-tears-are-gems>  
> \- Sabrina's art for chapter 12: <http://akblake1.tumblr.com/post/85105764064/sabrinas-super-wonderful-depiction-of-ori-about>  
> \- The 'spear' from chapter 15 (if you've read it, you know exactly what I'm talking about): <http://akblake1.tumblr.com/post/85900826169/close-up-view-of-the-little-spear-of-rainbow>


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